


Knowledge of Dead Secrets

by rei_c



Series: Five Districts, Five Drugs [4]
Category: Supernatural
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Drug Use, Drunkenness, Dubious Consent, F/M, Felching, Incest, M/M, Magic, Mild Gore, Multi, Murder, Podfic Available, Polyamory, Public Sex, Rituals, Threesome - F/M/M, Voodoo
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2007-03-04
Updated: 2007-03-04
Packaged: 2020-09-02 07:56:08
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 10
Words: 55,112
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20272552
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rei_c/pseuds/rei_c
Summary: Dean goes to pick Sam up from Stanford and ends up finding more than he bargained for.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> There is also a podfic available! 
> 
> [Knowledge of Dead Secrets, as read by Rhea](https://archiveofourown.org/works/884630)

With traffic on Embarcadero behind him, Dean calls the registrar's office and says he works for a law firm he picked out of the San Francisco phone book not five minutes before, says that a "Samuel Winchester's applied for a job and lists Stanford as his current enrollment. It's just procedure, background checks, you know how it goes," and the woman on the other end of the phone sighs in agreement. He can hear her clicking away at a computer, hears her make a noise that only ever accompanies frowns.

"I'm sorry. Mr. Winchester was a student here, but he resigned his scholarship and transferred out four semesters ago. If you give me just one second," she says, and now Dean's not breathing. "Yes, we sent a transcript to the City College of San Francisco at that time." 

Dean exhales, flirts a bit more with the woman, and hangs up, muttering, "I am _so_ going to kill you when I track you down."

In the end, it's not that hard.

\-- 

He’s come here straight from New Orleans, still has wet heat clinging to every pore and the smell of crawfish leaking out of his clothes. One phone call from his father and he’s driven across the country to California to pick up his brother, only now he has to look for Sam, can’t anything be easy. 

Dean leaves Palo Alto and heads into San Francisco, calls City College on the way. They say Sam dropped out, lasted a few weeks and then abruptly quit, even though he was doing well in all of his classes. The only address they have is old, in the small French Quarter downtown, near Chinatown, and the woman Dean talks to is quick to remind him that Sam might not live there anymore. Dean takes the address anyway, heads downtown in the direction of a good cup of coffee and Sam, if he’s lucky. 

\--

It’s not New Orleans, nothing else is, but it’s better than he guessed. Dean parks the car in a lot, walks to a café, grabs a seat at a table on the street, and sits down, watching the people pass. A waitress comes out, starts to smile at him but then sees his amulet and Dean watches with a raised eyebrow as she pales. 

She forces her lips to curve, says, “Just a minute, sugar,” in an accent that doesn’t fit here, in the Bay, all low, thick molasses and plantation heat, before she disappears back inside. 

Dean turns in his chair, watches as she goes behind the counter and talks to a guy drying something off with a black towel, sees the guy look up at her, then through the window at Dean, before he puts the dish and towel down and comes out. 

Dean sizes the guy up, tall as him, but thinner, lean, skin the colour of strong coffee, and asks, “There a problem?” 

“No problem,” the guy says, and the accent, it matches the girl’s, sounds like it belongs in a bayou, not the Bay. “Marie’s due for a break, s’all. What can I get for you?” 

After a moment’s study, during which the waiter just stands there and smiles, eyes closed off, Dean leans back, props up one foot on the chair next to his, and says, “Cup of coffee, beignets if you have ‘em,” easy and loose. “Just came from down south, miss it already.” 

The waiter’s eyes tighten but the smile doesn’t waver. “Won’t be as good here, but we try. You waitin’ for anyone? Need me to take my time?” 

“Just me,” Dean says, flashing a smile at the waiter. “But I’m not in a hurry.” 

He watches with interest as the waiter goes back inside, moves behind the counter and starts talking to the waitress from before, Marie, and a couple others, all of whom look out at Dean once or twice each. Dean’s never been good at reading lips, but his interest sharpens when one of them says something that looks like ‘Sam’ from this far away, and when the door opens, a customer leaving, he hears something else, something about his amulet being a sign. 

Dean frowns, waits for his coffee and beignets, and wonders what the fuck’s going on. 

\--

The coffee’s hot, burns going down, but the taste of chicory lingers in his mouth, hints of liquorice and nuts sliding over his tongue. It’s good, not CC’s good, but better than he expected to find in San Francisco. The beignets are fresh, the choux warm and the sugar on top messy, clinging to his upper lip when he bites in. 

Dean eats, looking out at the buildings around him, smiling at the people passing by, and when he’s dipping a finger in the sugar on the plate, he pauses, frowns. There’s a design on the dish he hadn’t noticed before; he dumps the sugar and crumbs off the plate and straight onto the ground, swallowing the taste of pastry and chicory down once he sees the design, drawn in red on a white background. It curves and curls, highly stylised, but Dean can trace the echo of a vévé in the pattern, and his heart skips a beat. 

He doesn’t recognise which loa this vévé belongs to, and the name of the café doesn’t help, either, something French, not Creole, but now Dean’s got chills, because messing with vodou or hoodoo, whichever these people practice, is never a good idea and he thought he’d left that all behind in Louisiana. 

Dean’s about ready to leave some cash on the table and get the hell out of there, but he looks inside first, and is moving a moment later, taking his plate and mug inside, as if he’s helping out. Marie gives him a watery smile, the waiter doesn’t look at him, and Dean sets the dishes down on the counter before he jerks a thumb at the swinging bead curtain in a doorway at the back of the café and asks, “What’s back there? Bathrooms?” 

Marie blinks at him, then says, “No. Stairs leading up. We do shows, things like that. Sometimes. At night.”

“Huh,” Dean says, and no one in the café moves for a few seconds. 

At the same moment that Dean takes off in the direction of the bead curtain and the steps, his waiter and another guy move to stop him, but Dean spins out of their reaching grasp, pushes past them, and heads upstairs. 

The stairs curve at one point, and Dean runs into the wall, moving too fast to switch directions without it. The two chasing him nearly catch him, but they grab his jacket and he just moves out of it, leaves it in their hands, hearing them overbalance behind him. A door at the top of the steps, which opens under Dean’s hand, and then he’s standing stock-still, staring at the person sitting across the room, looking right at him with slanted eyes and an amused smile. Hands grab at his shoulders but he can’t move, can’t speak. 

“Well, my, my. Dean Winchester, we meet at last,” Sam says. “Been lookin’ forward to the day.”

Except, it doesn’t sound like Sam. Looks like him, sitting there, legs spread, slouching in the wide leather armchair like he doesn’t have anything better to do, mug of coffee on a small table next to him, next to a bottle of Jack, a couple empty shot glasses, a few paperback books, but it isn’t him, can’t be him. 

“_Christo_,” Dean says, forces out through closed throat. 

Sam, the Sam-thing, laughs, and leans forward. “Thank you, boys, but we’ll be fine from here, don’t you worry ‘bout nothing.”

Hands slide off of Dean’s shoulders, and Dean’s waiter says, “You’ll call if you need anything?” 

“O’course I will, child. Go on, now.”

The door behind Dean closes, he hears footsteps rattle down the stairs, and when it’s silent, when he can’t take the silence one moment longer, he asks, “What are you and where’s my brother?” 

“Oh, Dean,” Sam says, smile playing about the corners of his lips. “Sam was right about you. We gonna have some fun. Now, why don’t you come on in, sit down, stop hovering over there and let us have a look at you, a’right?”

“_Us_?” Dean echoes, though he moves, creeps around the edge of the room until he’s sitting on a black leather sofa across the room from Sam. “How many of you are in him?” 

Sam leans back in the chair, pours two shot glasses full of Jack without looking, passes one over to Dean. Dean looks down at it, smells it, and finally shrugs, throws the whisky back and holds the glass out for more. 

“At the moment?” Sam says, pouring. “Seems to be about four of us. Usually around six, seven, but you’ve got some of ‘em a little wary, between what Sam’s told us and then seeing you come up in here with those weapons.” Sam takes the shot glass from Dean, lets his thumb swipe over Dean’s skin, and when Dean jerks back, Sam laughs, low and long, drinks the shot, and gives Dean the bottle. 

Dean feels naked; knowing that the things inside of Sam know about his weapons, it takes away his advantage, his security. He holds the bottle, lets it hang from one hand, and says, “What do you want with my brother? And what should I call you, because I am _not_ calling you Sam.” 

“Call me Papa,” Sam grins, and when Dean flinches, frowns, Sam says, “Oh, you ain’t got a lick o’ humour in you. Fine, fine. Call me Ati, a few of the others do.” 

“All right, Ati,” Dean says, swallowing at the look in Sam’s—Ati’s—eyes. “What do you want with my brother?”

Ati leans forward, looks like he’s perfectly at home in Sam’s body, and Dean can’t help but wonder how long Sam’s been possessed for, how long the things have been using him. 

“Better ask what your brother wants with us,” Ati says, and its his imagination, but Dean feels the room warm up, feels swamp heat drip from Ati’s voice. “Boy ain’t one of us, but we fit in him better than in our own. Can’t say he minds us, either. You should hear him and Danny-girl go ‘round and ‘round. Bicker like an ol’ married couple, those two.”

Dean’s stomach sours, and he tosses back a couple swallows of Jack, tries not to think that maybe his brother invited them in, because Sam knows better, he does. If Sam did, if he was that monumentally stupid, then getting them out, once Dean knows what exactly they are, is going to be even harder. 

“Can I talk to him?” Dean asks, voice and throat coated with fear for Sam, furred over with whisky. 

Ati slants his head, sends his eyes into shadow, and the voice that comes out holds echoing strands of other voices, male and female, old and young. 

“Soon, Dean. Time’s not right yet.” 

“When will it be right?” Dean asks, and even though he knows that demons lie, he can’t help thinking that Ati’s been telling him the truth all along. 

Ati smiles, the expression and the look so foreign on Sam’s face. “Soon. Real soon, son.” 

\--

Dean drinks the rest of the whisky, and when that’s done, Ati takes the bottle back, stands up and stretches. Dean hears joints pop and bones crack, and then Ati’s moving out of this living room area and through a doorway at one end. He follows Sam’s body, studies the room he’s been sitting in for the first time, giving the kitchen they walk into a look as well, after. 

The place is done up in white and black, with other colours dotting certain areas, reds and purples more than anything. All of the artwork on the walls looks Creole, even Haitian, and the rug on the floor of the kitchen, made out of scrap fabric and covering pristine white tile, outlines a vévé that Dean thinks belongs to Ayidah Wedo. There are a few plants tucked into corners, but everything is, on the whole, rather minimalist, with lots of open space, furniture flush against walls. 

Ati’s put the empty bottle in the sink, is rummaging around in the back of a cabinet for something else, and Dean steps into the kitchen, leans against one wall and looks at a row of bottles sitting on the windowsill above the sink. One of them is filled with red dirt, another with black dirt, a third with something that looks like red-tinted oil, yet another with something dry, maybe cloves of garlic, Dean’s not sure. 

“Know they hid it back here somewhere,” Ati mutters, and then pulls his head out of the cabinet, rolls his eyes at Dean, and yells, “Where’d you thankless people hide the booze, heya? Expect me to hang around here if there ain’t any rum? Be hurryin’, or I’ll sic Ogou on y’all, y’hear me?”

Dean raises an eyebrow, then raises the other when he hears two people come scurrying out of a hallway he’d looked down, not too closely, on his way to the kitchen. The first person entering the kitchen is a woman, dressed in jeans and a pink tank top, tattoos of hearts twisting up both arms, and she clucks her tongue at Ati and points at the table before putting her hands on her hips. 

“No need to get huffy,” Ati mumbles, but he sits down, drums out a short pattern on the table, and asks, “Well?”

She sighs, opens a different cabinet, and reaches back inside, pulls out a half-filled bottle, and thumps it down on the table in front of Ati. 

“That’s my girl,” he says, giving her a grin, then tucks his fingers in her belt-loops and pulls her close, until she’s sitting on one knee. He tucks a curl back behind one of her ears, tugs playfully on an earlobe, and says, grin turning rakish, “How ‘bout a kiss for ol’ Papa?” 

Dean leans back, folds his arms across his chest, and watches with something approaching disbelief as the girl sighs again, then leans forward, pecks Ati on the cheek. The girl, Dean should be calling her a woman, fair enough, because she has to be _older_ than Sam, probably Dean’s age or a couple years older, and her skin’s as dark and clear as Marie’s downstairs, the waiter’s, too, moves to get up, but Ati’s not letting go of her belt loops, and pulls her back down. 

“Pretty please, _tifi_?” Ati says, and then his voice deepens, and Dean can only listen in fascination as Ati croons, “_Chere mo lemme t'oi, chere mo lemme t'oi, mo lemme t'oi, mo lemme.”_

He gets cut off, the girl smiling even though she’s trying not to, and she tangles her hands in Ati’s hair, plants her lips on his. 

Dean can see tongue, and part of him wants to grin and say, ‘_All right, little brother_,’ because she’s hot, curvy and pliant in Ati’s hands, reminds Dean a little of what Cassie might be like if she was a little heavier, a little softer. Part of him, though, the bigger part, remembers that she isn’t kissing _Sam_, that Sam might have a problem with all of this, so he clears his throat after a moment. 

Neither Ati nor the girl stop, and the other person who’d come running down the hall, who’s been lingering in the doorway behind Dean, says, “Wasting your breath. There ain’t no stopping them once they get started.” 

Dean turns around, blinks twice.

“I’m Théo,” the man says. “Judging by the look on your face, you met Pierre downstairs. We’re twins.” Théo smiles, adds, “I’m the older one, by the way. The girl locking lips with Ati’s Sophie.”

“Here I thought I was in California,” Dean mutters.

Apparently it’s loud enough for Théo to hear, because he starts laughing. “We’re all from Louisiana, if that’s what you’re asking, ‘cept for Soph. Most of us moved here when we were younger, Sophie was born out this way. Still, it shouldn’t surprise you that we’ve all drifted together.” 

Dean eyes the border around the top of the kitchen walls, hand-painted curlicues that make him think of Maman Brigitte, of parish cemeteries and the smell of camphor. “No,” he says. “It doesn’t.”

Sophie’s leaning her head on Ati’s shoulder, looking at Dean, and Ati says, “This here’s Dean,” as he’s stroking fingers through her hair. 

Théo straightens up, lays an appraising gaze over Dean, and says something in Creole that Dean doesn’t understand. Sophie’s brow furrows, but Ati smoothes it out with his thumb and answers Théo in the same language. Whatever Ati says must relax him, because Théo finally moves away from the doorway to the kitchen, where he’d been leaning, and opens the fridge door. 

“Dean, you thirsty? Ati’ll be hogging that bottle all afternoon,” he asks, before reaching in and pulling out a bottle of water, placing it on the table in front of Sophie. “Got beer, some juice, Cokes, or there’s coffee downstairs we can bring up.” 

“Beer,” Dean says, pretty sure that this situation calls for something alcoholic, feeling the edges of a quarter bottle of Jack brush against his sobriety and thinking it’s not nearly enough. 

Théo gives Dean a bottle, says something about getting some food from his brother, and Dean hears him leave, hears him open a door and head downstairs, feet clanging on the wooden steps. 

Dean pops the top of the beer, chugs down a third of it, and looks at Sophie, who’s been watching him from her perch on Ati’s knee. 

“D’you talk?” Dean asks, eyes drifting from his brother’s face to the girl. 

“Only when someone else is doing it for her,” Ati says.

Dean nods, but as he’s taking another swallow of beer, he thinks about it, connects that with the vévés, and says, throat tight, “She’s a horse.” 

”We prefer the term ‘vodouisante,’ _repozwa_ if you’d like,” Ati says, sounding like Sam for the first time that day, though the grin on his face, a little hungry, a little amused, isn’t at all something Sam would wear. “But you’re right, Dean. My _tifi_ don’t talk, not unless she’s being ridden.” 

“And who rides her?” Dean asks, can’t help but ask. His fingers are itching to move, to grab one of his guns and put a bullet in her head, or to take up one of his knives and kill her, because killing horses, that’s what he’s been taught to do, horses, _houngons_, and _mambos_. Safer to kill one than to leave one alive, even one that can’t talk, and he’s just come from Louisiana, just done the same thing there, cleared out a whole parish of them. 

Ati’s face is solemn, though his eyes are flashing and his lips are still curved in that half-mocking grin. “One o’ the Rada.”

Dean’s ready to ask _which_ Rada loa, ready to give in and admit that Ati’s toying with him now, because he wants to know, it’s always easier to kill them if he knows what loa might come and try to help, but then he thinks about the hallway, the way Sophie and Théo both came running out when Ati called, so instead, he asks, “And Théo? Who rides him?” 

“I don’t s’pose you’d believe me if I said I do, would you?” Ati asks, eyes gleaming with laughter. 

For a moment, Dean thinks that means Ati’s one of the loa himself, is kicking his brain trying to think of which one, but then Sophie shifts, presses her lips to Ati’s neck and gets up, takes her water and leaves, and Dean swallows, mind chasing down a different direction. 

“You fuck them both,” he says, half a question. 

He wishes he could be surprised, shocked, _something_, when Ati says, “I fuck Sophie. Théo fucks me. Sometimes we mix it up, sometimes we do it at the same time.” Instead, he just feels the blood drain out of his face, feels angry and confused, and is about ready to reach for one of his knives when he remembers that this is _Sam_, Sam’s body, Sam still somewhere inside. 

“Don’t you worry ‘bout your brother, son,” Ati says, and this time he’s completely serious. “We take good care of him, can’t do nothing else. Wouldn’t want to. And when the time’s right, I promise you, we’ll tell you everything you’re wanting to know. Just give it some time and trust him, trust me, a’right? I ain’t gonna lie to you, swear it to _le gran met_.” Ati pauses, then adds, “I know you heard of Bondye. I know you know what that means, Dean Winchester.” 

Dean feels hollow as he nods. “I know what it means. Guess I don’t have a choice,” he says in a mutter, bitter rage at his helplessness flooding out through the words. His eyes flash as he looks at Ati, and he says, “If he’s hurt, if you’ve done something to him,” before trailing off. 

Ati returns the stare, looking out of Sam’s eyes, and it’s almost like Dean can see more than one of them in there, can almost see the different fragments of different demons. 

“My hand to Bondye,” Ati says, repeating himself. 

\--

Théo comes back up a few minutes later, carrying a tray made from whitewashed wood. He sets the tray on the table and Dean sees a small pot of steaming gumbo, a loaf of muffuletta cut into pieces, and a plate piled to overflowing with beignets. 

“Pierre said you liked them,” Théo says when he sees Dean’s expression, moving around the kitchen like he lives here, pulling out bowls and plates, silverware and glasses. He sets the table quickly, precisely, but only two places, and when Dean asks, Théo says, “We don’t eat with Ati when he has guests,” without embarrassment. 

Dean cocks an eyebrow but doesn’t say anything else, just lets Théo serve him, watches Ati scooping up gumbo with pieces of bread, and compares how this stranger inside of his brother eats with the way he remembers Sam eating.

Ati eats with his hands, doesn’t bother with the fork and spoon Théo laid out, just dips his bread in the bowl and scoops, leaning over the bowl so as not to spill. Ati’s hands are Sam’s hands, but there are scrapes and scars Dean doesn’t remember, a certain relaxed easiness that Sam never possessed. Sam always ate with knife and fork, used to roll his eyes at Dean for picking at food with his hands, and Sam hated wine with a passion. Ati drinks it down like water, eats slow, like he hasn’t got anything better to do, like he savours every bite, every taste. 

Looking out of the corner of his eye, Dean sees Théo bustling around the kitchen, setting up a pot on the stove, chopping up vegetables on the counter. Théo watches Ati, though, and every time Ati finishes a glass of wine, Théo fills the glass back up, at Ati’s shoulder, silent and watchful. 

Ati finally finishes his second bowl of gumbo, and when Théo hovers over him in something like a silent question, Ati pets Théo’s arm and says, “S’good, child. Y’ain’t lost your touch. Even Dean’s on seconds, and that’s after a couple beignets downstairs.” 

Dean blinks, didn’t realise he was being watched that closely, but when Théo looks at him, he nods, uses a piece of bread to scrape the last of the roux from the bottom of the bowl. 

“He’s right,” Dean says, almost sounding surprised. “It’s good.” 

Théo smiles, takes the bowls away, and washes them, moving around in silence as he takes things out of the fridge, throws them in the simmering pot on the stove, pours coffee for the two at the table. 

Dean sips at the coffee, hums in appreciation as it runs thick down his throat, and picks up a beignet, tips it so the extra sugar falls off onto the plate, ignoring the vévé drawn on the plate underneath the pastries and the way it makes his skin crawl. 

\--

Ati leans back when he’s done, hands on his belly, and belches, long and loud. Dean, in the middle of a bite, nearly chokes, because that’s just not Sam, and he’s about ready to chastise his little brother when he looks up, sees Ati watching him with dark eyes. 

Dean gives Ati a tight smile, swallows, and asks, “When’re you gonna tell me what’s going on?” Théo, visible over Ati’s shoulder, stops mid-stir, but doesn’t move his gaze from whatever he’s cooking, whatever smells spicy-sweet with andouille and peppers. He’s listening, waiting for Ati’s reply like it means something, like he’s worried, and that’s intriguing. 

Ati hums, burps, leans back and looks up at the ceiling.

“Well?” Dean asks. 

Ati cuts him off, holds up a hand and says, “Now, hold on, son. Me ‘n the others, we gotta talk about this. Can’t go running around making decisions for everyone. Danny’d kill me, and Ogou’d help her out, that’s what I think, and wouldn’t that be a doozy? Gimme a couple,” and his eyes droop closed, not all of the way, just enough to leave a thin strand of white visible. It chills Dean, just as much as seeing an echoing stripe of skin where the t-shirt’s ridden up from the waistband of the jeans Ati’s wearing.

Théo’s stirring the pot again, slow and careful, and he looks over, meets Dean’s eyes. There’s defiance in Théo’s brown eyes, defiance and fear, hostility under a thin veneer of hospitality, but Dean gives back as good as he gets, more, even, because he’s angry, has it battering around inside of his bones, bitter and deep. 

Théo tilts his head, like he understands, like he recognises whatever Dean’s trying to say, and goes back to cooking, less concerned now. 

Dean feels like he just passed a test, but he doesn’t know what the question was or even how he answered it. 

“Tonight, we be having some friends over,” Ati finally says, though there’s a different register to the tone, the vowels drawn out more, the consonants lazy, almost rumbled despite the vaguely nasal sound they have now. Dean’s eyes flick to Théo, who stiffened when he heard Ati speak, stiffened and then went right for the cabinet Sophie pulled the rum out of. 

Théo places another bottle of rum on the table, but this one’s dark, looks and smells thick, like honey, and his movements are slow, cautious. “Lakwa,” Théo says, and Dean’s eyes narrow, because he can almost see the outline of _something_ around Sam’s—Ati’s—Lakwa’s head. 

“Lakwa,” Dean says, tone flat. He almost doesn’t believe it, but then Ati’s eyes open, and they aren’t Ati, just like they aren’t Sam. 

“Heya, Dean Winchester,” Lakwa says, tipping his head before he holds out a hand. 

Théo moves, crosses the kitchen fast, opens a drawer and takes out a pack of cigars and a lighter, places them gently into Lakwa’s hand. 

Dean raises an eyebrow, because Théo’s attitude has completely changed, but when Lakwa lights the cigar and starts smoking, eyes still fixed on Dean, he thinks he understands. Ati was fun, almost playful, teasing, and there’s a hint of that in Lakwa, but Lakwa poses a greater threat, somehow, and it’s nothing in the way he sits, just something about him, about the look in his eyes and the way he blows smoke out of his mouth. 

“You’re having friends over tonight,” Dean says, cautious. “Does that mean I won’t be able to talk to Sam until afterwards?” 

Lakwa smiles around the cigar, takes it out and blows a perfect succession of smoke rings. “Sounds ‘bout right, young’un. And since I be answering your questions, howsabout you answer one of mine.” Dean nods, just once, and Lakwa tilts his head, says, “Mighty gracious of you, Dean.” There’s no pause, no change in tone, from Dean’s name to Lakwa’s question, demand. “Tell me about the vodouisantes you just came here from killing.” 

Dean’s mouth dries as Théo drops the plate he’s wiping off with a towel. The sound of it dropping onto the floor, shattering, echoes, as Dean feels two sets of eyes on him, one pair shocked, the other old and knowing. 

“What do you want me to say?” Dean asks, suddenly tired, like being so angry, so worried, so wary and tense, for the past couple of hours has worn him out, worn him down. “You want me to apologise? Say I’m sorry? You know just as well as I do that I’m not, not in the least, and if you weren’t holding my brother hostage, I’d get rid of you just the same.” 

“You think we’re loa, then?” Lakwa asks, leaning forward, suddenly intent. 

Dean shrugs, throws out his arms, and says, “I don’t know _what_ the fuck’s going on, okay? Is that what you wanna hear? You’re not demons, then fine, you’re loa, and you all take turns fucking Sam over, riding the others, getting your rocks off. That what you want me to say?” 

Lakwa leans back in the chair, eyes gleaming with interest, and he drawls, “Good enough, Dean. That be good enough for me. Now, the second one you killed, tell me about her.”

“The second one,” Dean says, and when Lakwa nods, picks up the bottle of rum and downs a few thick swallows, Dean sighs, rubs one hand over his forehead. 

According to another hunter’s information, there had been six priestesses and three priests in Plaquemines Parish. Dean had stayed in a small, run-down motel in Buras-Triumph and stalked the nine of them, spread out over the parish, for three weeks before he made his move. The first one, one of the priests, he’d shot twice, once in the heart and once in the head, before decapitating the body and burning it in a pyre of river birch and brick dust. He’d done the other two men the same way, but none of them were horses, just _houngons_. 

The second one he killed was an _asogwe_, a purported favourite of Erzulie Freda. Killing her had taken time, the loa kept coming back, flooding Dean’s senses with a haze of pink femininity. He’d gone in with a gun, planned on giving her three shots of lead, but he’d ended up dazed and frantic, had hacked away at her with a knife under the influence of some enraged madness until he’d come back to his senses covered in blood, the _mambo_'s body in pieces all around him, on him. 

Dean swallows down bile and gumbo, thinking of how he’d vomited, how he’d walked out and burnt the house before going back and scrubbing himself raw to get the feeling out of his skin, off of him. He smells blood through the cloud of smoke Lakwa’s pouring out, and shudders, downs a full cup of coffee, cleaning out the smell in his nostrils with the overpowering scent of strong chicory.

He looks up and sees Lakwa studying him, sees Théo waiting for an answer, and Dean shakes his head. “Her name was Stefanie. She’d been studying vodou since she was a child. Her mother was a practitioner, and her father, I never found anything out about him. She was a grand authority,” and Théo sinks to his knees, covers his mouth.

“The loa came on her when I was,” Dean says, unable to say what he was there to do, ashamed for the first time in his life. “I killed her.” 

“Did you?” Lakwa asks, and something about the question makes Dean stop, makes Théo sob and look up at Lakwa, the way he’s sitting there, so calm, so quiet. “Tell me something, chile. What was it feelin’ like, when you be killing the _asogwe_?” 

Dean looks down at his hands, eyes flicking over his fingers, at the hands that held the knife and carved a woman to pieces. “I don’t know,” he says, quiet. “I wasn’t. I wasn’t all there.”

“You done gone and killed eight of ‘em, Dean. The second one, that girl ain’t your fault.” Lakwa’s lips curl around the cigar, and he holds out the bottle of rum in a salute. “You, boy. You know what it be feeling like under the bridle. You be ridden, boy, by one of the Petro who have a thing ‘gainst ‘Zulie. Marinette, mebbe, we ain’t entirely sure yet, but it weren’t you.” 

“No,” Dean whispers, wide-eyed, looking at Lakwa. “No, that’s impossible.” 

Lakwa laughs, the sound sharp, startling Dean and Théo, by the way the other man jumps, flinches. “You rather be a buckaloose? You all tore up about it, now you ain’t gotta worry, Dean Winchester. You ain’t going crazy, you just be having one more thing in common with your brother.” 

Dean stops breathing as Lakwa grins, takes out his cigar, and drinks down the rum. Lakwa throws his head back, throat working as he swallows, and when he comes up for air, he’s grinning, puffs on the cigar once before stroking his hand down the bottle. Dean’s eyes follow the movement, and instead of seeing Sam’s hands, Ati’s scars, he sees bones. 

He knows. 

“Lakwa,” he murmurs, chest aching. “Baron La Croix. Baron Samedi. Fuck.”

A long, hearty laugh from Lakwa, who says, “We can be doing that, if’n you like, chile.” 

Dean sits there, staring, and finally asks, “Ati. Who?” 

Théo’s the one who answers, still kneeling on the floor amid broken pieces of ceramic. “Papa Legba,” he says, eyes clear, full of pain. “Legba Atibon.”

“And Danny?” Dean asks, once his throat’s remembered how to work. 

Lakwa’s eyes darken, deepen, and he says, “Danny’ll be wanting a word with you, son. Best not go stirring things up before the pot’s boiling, ayah.”


	2. Chapter 2

Dean’s been sitting on the living room couch for longer than he should’ve when he finally shakes himself out of his stupor. Théo’s next to him, leaning forward, legs spread and leaning on them, looking at the floor. He stirs slightly when Dean does, turns his head and looks at Dean with mournful eyes. 

“Didn’t hear you sit down,” Dean mutters, rubbing one hand over his eyes, his forehead. It’s too much to take in, even if the clock on the wall’s right and he’s been trying for the past three hours. 

“Didn’t think you’d mind if I did,” Théo says back, same volume, same sort of tone. “Lakwa sent me to stay with you, said he needed to talk to Sophie now that,” and he stops. 

Dean moves slightly, puts down an empty cup he doesn’t remember picking up, doesn’t remember drinking down the contents of. “Now that, what?” he asks, pushing. 

Théo’s eyes spark, some hidden depth of anger swimming under the surface of his sadness. “Now that _asogwe_ Stefanie’s dead. Sophie’s rider is Erzulie Freda, same loa, and with Stefanie gone, she’ll be the horse everyone’s watching. Erzulie likes her, almost as much as she liked Stefanie.” 

At Dean’s look of surprise, Théo gives him a slow, melancholic smile, and asks, “You didn’t think we were our own island out here, did you? Naw, we keep in touch with our roots, with the vodouisantes down in the parishes. Sometimes we go back and visit; more often than not, they’ve been coming out here, ever since your brother showed up.” 

“Sam,” Dean murmurs, and Théo looks back down at the floor, at his hands, clasped together, elbows resting on his knees. 

“I know that you, you kill people like us,” Théo says, haltingly. “And if it wasn’t your brother wearing the bridle, you’d probably go after all of us, too. But now, you have to realise, Dean, you’re one of us, too.”

Dean shakes his head before he starts saying, “No, no, I’m not. I’m not one of you at all. I’m nothing _like_ you people.” 

Théo’s smile comes like a smack in the face. “One of the Petro’s got her claws in you, Dean. They wouldn’t be keeping you around for tonight otherwise.” 

When Dean asks what that’s supposed to mean, Théo just shakes his head and gets up, going into the kitchen. 

\--

People start trickling in through the door at the top of the stairs an hour later. The smells coming from the kitchen are getting to Dean, just like the looks when people see him, the way they stop and stare, movements stuttering, before they move in and claim what seem like regular places on the furniture pressed against the walls. A few, that walk in together, come inside and don’t even look at Dean, just make their way down the hallway, disappearing through a door, judging by the sound of one opening and closing again and again. 

Dean can’t take it, the way people are studying him, the way they’re whispering around him, Creole and Haitian French floating across to him. He stands, goes in to the kitchen, where it’s just Théo, laying out plates and bowls, someone he knows and has come to some unspoken truce with. 

“What’s for dinner?” Dean asks, looking over Théo’s shoulder, into the large, simmering pot. The smell of andouille and chicken and crawfish, mixed with green pepper, onion, garlic, floods Dean’s nose, and he reaches in to scoop up a bite. 

Théo smacks his hand with a wooden spoon, one that has something white stuck to it, little granule of flour or some kind of powder, and Dean frowns, takes his hand back and rubs his knuckles. He sees Théo stifle a smile, though, and Dean thinks that maybe, just maybe, Théo really does think Dean’s a part of the family. 

What that says about Dean, well. He’d rather not think about that. 

“Jambalaya,” Théo finally says. “Big pot for the gathering. Grits, some baguette, and pie for dessert. Enough for everyone and seconds besides.” Théo pauses, then asks, “You came up here straight from New Orleans?” 

Théo’s voice has no inflection, but the hand holding the spoon, dipping into the jambalaya, is tight, skin white, spoon shaking. 

Dean steps back, across the kitchen, and grabs a beer from the fridge, waiting for comment. When none comes, he says, “Yeah. Plaquemines Parish. Swamp country.” 

“There’s good shrimp down there,” Théo says. Dean nods, and Théo adds, as if making a confession, “Pierre and I were born in Belle Chasse, in the north end of the parish,” and Dean blinks, because he’d almost forgotten about the waiter downstairs. “Our father was part of the Reserves group there, met _maman_ and we were born ten months later. She died when we were young’uns, and we moved out here, into our auntie’s house, right before Hurricane Andrew.” 

“What happened to your father?” Dean asks, voice soft, because he understands the pain of losing a parent, but he still had John, might’ve lived a cracked-out mockery of a childhood, but at least he had his father. 

Théo’s face tightens, and he drops the lid on the pot of jambalaya, turns fast, checks another pot, the grits, Dean thinks, before he takes a few baguettes out of the small oven. “He didn’t want us,” Théo says. “We were too black for his taste.”

There’s not much Dean can say to that, so he keeps his mouth shut, pops the top off of his beer and starts swallowing. 

“Sam told us about the way you two grew up,” Théo says, once it looks like he’s gained some semblance of calm. “I thought it was only fair you should know. He’s like a brother to us, brother, teacher, and lover all in one.” 

“You mean the loa are,” Dean says, tasting bitterness on his tongue again, lurking and lingering under the beer. “They’re the ones controlling his body.”

Théo smiles, and looks at Dean. Dean’s taken off-guard, the raw sensuality in Théo’s smile, the way he’s looking at Dean, head down-tilted, shadows highlighting the high arch of Théo’s cheekbones. 

“Sam’s in there, Dean,” Théo says, and the words, half-whispered, half-crooned, echo in Dean’s ears. “He’s in there. There ain’t nothing they do with his body that he ain’t agreed to.” Théo steps closer to Dean, the edges of his lips curving up a little more, and he adds, “And damn, Dean. You should listen to him when he’s agreeing.” 

Dean swallows, doesn’t want to think about what that means, and he’s saved when Sophie comes into the kitchen, gives them both a curious look, and starts signing at Théo, hands moving too fast for Dean to keep track of. 

Théo sighs, gives Dean a look that promises more of the same discussion later, and leans his head out into living room. “Food’s on, y’all,” he says, and moves out of the way as people start coming into the kitchen in the same twos and threes they entered the little apartment in, serving themselves, dropping jambalaya into bowls, grits into smaller bowls, tearing off chunks of bread, grabbing a glass of wine or a bottle of beer, ooh-ing and ah-ing over the pies cooling on the counter near the sink.

Dean watches, and when they’re all eating, spread out moreso now than before, all over the living room and the kitchen, he sits down, takes a bowl filled to the brim from Théo. 

“You’ll be needing your strength, Dean,” he says gently. “I know you pro’ly ain’t hungry, but you need to eat. For Sam,” he adds, and Dean wants to growl, wants to snarl back, but Théo’s picked out Dean’s one weakness, one older brother to another, and Dean takes the spoon and fork that Théo offers. 

\--

The food’s as good as the gumbo they had a few hours ago, but Dean can’t make his throat work, can’t swallow. He slurps some grits down, thick and heavy with butter, washes the smell of bread out of the back of his mouth with another beer, until the nervous buzzing in his veins has evened out some, taken down into his stomach with hot food and eased off the edge with cold alcohol. 

He’s sitting there, silent and tense, watching the others move in and out, and things start to turn a little hazy. Dean blinks, opens his mouth and tries to speak, but nothing comes out, just a croaking hiss, and the noise gets Théo’s attention, who looks at him, then nods and whispers something to Sophie. 

“What?” Dean asks, the word feeling unfamiliar on his tongue, the way his mouth shapes the foreign sound, clacking against his teeth. 

Théo crouches next to Dean, places a hand on his forehead, and says, “Hush now, Dean. It’s all right.” 

Dean blinks, can’t do much more, his entire body slipping out from under his mind, and even his mind seems to be caught, trapped, on its way to sleep. 

His vision’s starting to blur, and then he sees Sam crouch down next to Théo, reaching out to touch Dean’s cheek. 

“Sam,” he murmurs, the hiss of the ‘s’ drawn out, long and serpentine.

Sam smiles, and Dean remembers that he shouldn’t trust that, that it’s not Sam, but it looks like him, eyes shining with tears, and when Sam says, “I’m sorry, Dean,” it sounds like him, too. 

Sam turns to Théo, says, “Get everyone ready, Théo. We’ll need Erzulie Freda to hold the Petro, and Baron Cimetière’ll be there to help guide her through the guédé. Are you ready to start the _aksyon degras_?” 

Théo inclines his head, stands up and places a hand on Sam’s shoulder, squeezes. Dean tries to say something, seeing it, but he can’t, can only listen, vision blurring and then fading completely, as he hears Théo say, “Ogou’ll come. He’s ready and aching for a ride. Thirsty,” and Dean falls unconscious to the sound of Sam’s laughter. 

\--

It’s not a slow slide into consciousness when Dean wakes up. One minute he’s not awake, the next he is, quick as that, awake and reaching for a knife, reaching under the pillow, before it sinks in that he’s not in a motel room and there’s no knife within reaching distance. He opens his eyes and hisses at the light, blinks and lets his pupils adjust before he moves his hands to rub them. He stops, though, smelling ash and rum on his hands, and he studies his hands, coated in a veil of thin, white powder. 

“Huh.” Dean sits up, looks around, and sees that he’s in a room, stretched out on a bed low and close to the ground, black comforter under him, edged in red. The entire room’s done in white and black, much like the living room—and he swings his feet off the edge, tries to stand up, because he realises he must be in one of the rooms off of the hallway, in the apartment above the café. He tries to remember how he got here, what happened, and the closest he can get is eating in the kitchen, throwing back beer and a bowl of grits. 

His head aches, and he falls back to the bed when he tries to stand, wavering on his feet, dizzy, mouth dry. There’s a glass of water on a table next to the bed, and he picks it up, has it halfway to his mouth when he stops, sees his hand shaking, sees that fine powder falling off and onto the floor. 

“Son of a bitch,” he mutters, and throws the glass, sees it shatter into pieces against the far wall, water tracking a line from him to the wall and then exploding outwards. “Son of a _bitch_,” he says again, louder this time, and then yells out, “Someone get in here!” 

Théo opens the door, says, “Someone’ll be in here soon,” and starts to close the door. 

“Now you listen, Théo, you little punk,” Dean says, but he’s cut off by the sight of a tight smile on Théo’s face. 

“I’m Pierre. Théo’s busy. Stay here, someone’ll be in soon,” and he shuts the door, locks it from the outside.

It takes Dean a minute, but he cusses internally, the twin, the waiter, not Théo, and he should’ve known that. He stands up, holding on to the table for support, and breathes through the dizziness, the pain in his legs and arms, the way his left hand doesn’t seem to want to work, wants to stay clawed up. 

Once he can move, he goes to the door, tries the handle, but it’s locked, something he can’t overpower. He blinks, tries to focus on his side of the lock, but his vision swims. “Come _on_,” he mutters to himself, and reaches in the back pocket of his jeans, pulls out a paperclip. He jams it in the lock, pushes and prods, and somehow jimmies it open minutes later. 

He opens the door, walks through it, right hand on the wall, because the hallway’s moving, fading in and out, changing colours like he’s looking at it through a prism, but when he gets to the living room, he stops, and his eyes focus on Sam, lying on the floor, naked from the waist up, covered in tattoos that twine up his chest, around his sides onto his back, up and down his arms to the elbow, bones and arrows and snakes, curling lines in black and white between them, connecting them all. 

“Sam,” he breathes, and propels himself forward with enough force so that he lands on his knees near Sam’s head. He reaches out, checks his brother’s pulse, pushing Sophie out of the way. “_Sam_, come on,” he says, then looks up, pins a glare on everyone. “What the _fuck_ happened?” 

Théo comes out of the kitchen carrying two of the glass jars from the windowsill, it has to be Théo, because Pierre’s sitting on the other side of Sam, chanting something. Théo lays out red dust around Sam’s body, murmuring something in French while he does, then opens the bottle of red-tinted oil and starts drawing symbols on Sam’s forehead, under Sam’s heart, on Sam’s palms. 

Sophie reaches for Dean, tries to pull him away, but he throws her off, pushes her away, and asks again, “What. Happened.” 

“In a minute,” Théo says, and then dips his fingers in the oil, swipes them across Sam’s lips. 

Just like that, Sam’s coughing, eyes open, like he’s eaten something a little too spicy, not as if he hasn’t been breathing. 

“Ro, come on, the ro, gimme the ro,” Sam gasps, one hand pressed to his throat as the tattoos on his body seem to _move_. Dean blinks, chalks it up to dizziness, the way his head’s pounding, and before he can do anything, Pierre’s slipping something white between Sam’s lips, is stroking Sam’s throat to get him to swallow. 

Sam does, and he’s shaking, muscles seizing, one after another after another, and Dean doesn’t know how long he just sits there for, his sight fading in and out, his head pounding. Sam eventually calms, until he’s just barely twitching, and then he’s still for all of a handful of seconds, Dean thinks, until his spine bends, back arching off of the ground, hands clawing at the carpet. 

Dean leans forward, but then Sam collapses, panting, and says, “It’s done. She’s gone,” and the tension in the room disappears completely. Sophie, already kneeling, sinks to her hands, as if the bones in her body have given out, cracked under some enormous pressure, and Dean looks up to see Pierre sag against one of the chairs, sees Théo come over and drop to his knees next to Sam, lean down and take Sam’s cheeks in his hands, press his forehead against Sam’s, getting that red oil all over his face and palms. 

“Don’t scare me like that again, please,” Théo whispers, and Sophie crawls forward enough to lay her head on Sam’s stomach. Dean can only watch as Sam lifts his hands, one tangling in Sophie’s hair, the other reaching up, covering one of Théo’s hands. “Don’t scare us like that, you crazy man.”

“It had to be done,” Sam murmurs, before he tilts his chin up and kisses Théo. “You know it had to be done,” and then Théo’s sobbing into Sam’s mouth, kissing Sam like if he doesn’t, if he stops, Sam might disappear and never come back. 

A moment later, Sophie crawls up Sam’s body and butts Théo’s head aside, kisses Sam herself, while Théo starts sucking on Sam’s jaw, biting the bone, the skin, the curve. Sam’s lying on the ground, on his back, with one on each side, and it’s like the three of them have fallen into their own universe, completely ignorant of everything and everyone else as they kiss, as Théo’s hands start fumbling with Sam’s jeans, as one of Sam’s hands cups one of Sophie’s breasts, thumb rubbing back and forth across her nipple. 

Dean can’t help but watch, can’t help but feel the level of desperate sexuality rise in the air, hot and clinging. He can’t move, but Pierre gets to his feet, steps around the three on the floor and takes Dean by the shoulder, hauls him up and into the kitchen, and Dean’s filled with a certain measure of relief. 

Pierre pushes him into a chair, the same one he was in before, and then hands Dean a glass of water and two white pills. 

Dean looks at them suspiciously, says, “You people fucking _drugged_ me. You think I’m gonna be stupid enough to let you do it again?” 

“Aspirin, _idiote_,” Pierre says, scoffing. “You wouldn’t have helped us any other way, and we needed you.” 

“To do _what_?” Dean asks, incredulous, voice rising as he slams the glass of water on the table. “Just what the fuck was that all about?”

Pierre leans against the counter, folds his arms across his chest, and speaks in a very precise rhythm, none of the words accented, and that almost makes it worse to listen to. 

“Most of the time, the loa get along. Not all of them like each other, but they’ve come to a few agreements about certain things, about territory and horses, truces to stay out of one another’s way. Your brother, he’s special.” Dean snorts, but Pierre continues as if he hadn’t heard anything. 

“He has vévés drawn inside of his head, somehow, because he doesn’t need anything to call the loa, they’re just _there_, in him, riding him. It’s smooth, like a demonic possession without any outward sign, without needing a ceremony or Ati to open the doors. Sam was drawn to us when he saw our dishes, the vévé painted on them. He said they looked familiar, like something he’d been dreaming about. We included him in a ritual, and he was ridden by nine separate loa that night.” 

Dean blinks, feels like the breath’s been knocked out of him. Nine loa, and Sam survived. Nine loa, and Sam didn’t even have the benefit of a drawn vévé, nothing to help him. 

“They never really left, after that, and when they did, Sam wasn’t well. Without the loa, at least one of them, he’s not complete, can’t cope, needs things to calm him down.”

Dean sees red. “Needs things,” he says, then asks, “Needs _things_? Drugs, you mean. Those pills you were giving him, what were they?” 

“We don’t like it any more than you do,” Pierre says, still calm. “What Sam is, what he means to us, we’d do anything to protect him. We have done whatever it takes, broken many laws, many times. If there was a way around it.” 

Dean cuts him off, says, “What was it?” 

Pierre pauses, finally answers, “Rohypnol. Very small amounts, just enough to calm him.” 

“That what you gave me?” Dean spits out. “That why I can’t remember anything that happened? My brother was _dead_, he wasn’t _breathing_, and I was sleeping off a roofie in the back room?”

“In Sam’s room,” Pierre says, voice soft even as it corrects Dean, doesn’t argue with the rest of his summation, merely says, “He said it was needed. We’ll do whatever it takes to keep him happy, to help his work.”

Dean stands up, looks into the living room, and stops, brain still shaking off the effects of the Rohypnol, now trying to parse the tangle of limbs and oil-slick skin in front of him, the way clothes are thrown all over the place and Sam’s arching over Sophie, fucking her slow and sweet, giant hands holding hers out to the side, pinned on the floor, his spine curved as Théo kneels behind Sam and thrusts, head thrown back and eyes closed. 

“Dean,” Pierre says, and Dean skitters out of the way when he feels a hand on his shoulder. He turns and glares at Pierre, who steps back, hands up, and says, “Why don’t you go get yourself a shower, some clean clothes? They’ll be a while, I’ve no doubt o’ that.” 

Dean doesn’t say no, turns back and can’t help the way his eyes slide to Sam, whose eyes are closed, who’s breathing out something in Creole, something that sounds low and dirty and begging, hair sticking to his skin. 

“Where’s the bathroom?” he asks, voice rasping in his throat, and after Pierre tells him, points down the hallway, Dean moves mechanically, eyes focused straight ahead, hearing the sounds of three people coming apart, coming together, behind him. 

\--

The bathroom’s done up just like the rest of the house, white and black, but in here it’s in a checkerboard pattern, with red thrown in every so often. Now that he’s looking for it, Dean sees hints of the loa all around, the small embroidered hearts on the towels, the miniature bottles of rum and whisky on the counter next to the toothbrush holder. There are three brushes in the holder, three different colours, and Dean thinks back, remembers how soft the bed was, how big, it was unreal, and this little slice of domesticity, it almost sinks in faster and deeper than actually seeing Sam in the middle of a ménage-a-trois. The three of them, or more, if he counts the loa, and that has Dean angry, turning on the shower with a little more force than necessary. 

The water’s hot when he finally gets in, and there are salts and soaps and oils to choose from, a row of shampoos and conditioners, and he picks one at random, something that curls liquid green on his palm and smells of limes. 

Dean stays in for half an hour, maybe longer, and when he pulls back the shower curtain, there are clothes piled on top of the toilet lid, set of pyjamas and outdoor clothes both, giving him the choice. Dean’s not sure who brought them in, brings the t-shirt up to his face and inhales. At first it’s just oranges, that and something else, something that smells vaguely like cinnamon, only nuttier, but the longer he inhales, the deeper his breaths get, the more he can smell _Sam_, spicy and rich, like coffee and chocolate mixed together with a hint of pepper, liquid and tangy. 

He ignores the way his cock’s twitching, pulls on boxer-briefs and then cotton pants, ties the drawstring around his waist and puts on the t-shirt, losing the last of his frown when it practically swims around him. One of Sam’s shirts, and it’s soft, worn, smells like Sam and whisky. 

Dean breathes deep, steels himself, and steps out into the hallway, only to be greeted by Pierre, lounging against the wall opposite, waiting. Dean raises an eyebrow, and in the silence, he hears them still going at it in the living room. 

“Again,” Pierre says, indulgent smile on his face, like he heard what Dean was thinking. “Slower this time. As I said, they’ll be a while.” 

“And you don’t care?” Dean asks, has to, because the noises they’re making, the sounds and smells wafting through the air, they’re enough to drive him crazy and he doesn’t live here, has no idea what’s going on. 

Pierre shrugs, pushes off the wall, feline grace, possessing the same danger as Théo but more aware of it, and says, “The three of them, they are a unit of their own. Sam loves them both equally, though in different ways, for what they mean to him, what they represent. When Sam is in his own mind, I stay out of the way.” 

He smiles, and Dean thinks it looks more like a cat about to pounce, rippling muscles and pointed canines, than a person’s expression. “But when certain of the loa bring him to bridle, then I have my turn,” Pierre says, stepping close to Dean as he adds, “Those times? They are like slices of heaven on earth, Dean. Have you never thought what it would be like to sink into him? Perhaps you should,” and he hums before he smiles, bares his teeth, and says, “The guest bedroom’s at the end of the hall.” 

“He’s my _brother_,” Dean says, though it takes time, voice shocked, disgusted, turned on, echoing down the hallway to where Pierre’s standing, framed by the light of the living room, whites of his eyes brilliantly vibrant. 

“Maybe when the loa are on him, then,” Pierre replies, dismissive.

Dean stands there, frozen, as Pierre leaves, goes into the kitchen, the sounds of Sam and Théo and Sophie bouncing off the walls, pushing Dean toward the end of the hallway. 

He moves, slips under thick quilts, patterned with vévés, and falls into a hazed sleep, his dreams shaded over with red, painted under with curlicues and ribbons, laughter wrapped around everything. 

\--

Dean wakes up to the smell of something frying, and when he looks at the clock on the wall, he sees that it’s nearly noon. He’d be surprised he slept so long if it hadn’t said four when he got into bed, and despite everything that happened last night, he feels refreshed, like he’s ready to face the day and everything it holds in store. He’s half-hard, thinks about ignoring it but doesn’t, reaching down under the covers and into his pants, underwear, and when he comes a few minutes later, it’s with the image of Sam, between Sophie and Théo, branded on the inside of his eyelids. 

It’s a little startling, but Dean wipes his hand off, gets up and pisses, washes his hands, then makes his way into the kitchen, pushing it all firmly in the back of his mind, determined not to think about it. Sam’s by the stove, has something cooking in a skillet, something else bubbling in a small saucepan, and there’s a cup of coffee sitting on the table. 

“Morning,” Sam says, looking over his shoulder at Dean for a moment before turning his attention back to the stove, flipping something that looks like ham. “Coffee’s yours. Should still be warm.” 

Dean picks up the mug, looks at it, thinks about asking if it’s spiked but doesn’t, just sits down, watches his brother move around the kitchen, start putting things on plates, in bowls. 

“The others are all downstairs,” Sam goes on, “so it’ll just be me and you for lunch. I thought you might appreciate that. We can talk.” 

“You and how many loa?” Dean snaps back, and he’s gratified to see Sam pause at that, pause and stand where he’s at, still, tense. 

Sam seems to shake himself out of it, though, slaps eggs, over-easy, home fries, and fried ham and tomatoes onto two plates, spoon up grits into a couple bowls, starts setting food on the table. A basket of toast and a carafe of orange juice get smushed in, along with extra glasses, silverware, and a cup of coffee for Sam, and then Sam sits down across from Dean. 

“Just two this morning,” he says, cutting in his eggs, letting the yolk ooze out over the potatoes. “Legba and the baron. Most of the others are taking it easy after last night, but those two usually always stick around.”

Dean drops his fork on the edge of his plate, waits for Sam to look up at him before he says, “_Sam_. We do _not_ talk about the loa like we’re discussing the weather. Especially,” he adds, harsh and biting, “after your little cult drugged me last night. Dude! Not cool. When am I gonna get some answers about that, huh?” 

“I thought we’d eat first,” Sam says, but he puts down his fork as well, slowly, and says, “Guess not. Fine. When you woke up this morning, how’d you feel?” 

“Felt fine,” Dean retorts, immediately. 

Sam rolls his eyes, asks, “Did you feel better than you have been? Better than the past few weeks?”

Eyes narrowed, Dean thinks back. “Yeah, a little,” he finally says, cautiously. “Why? What difference does that,” and he stops, Lakwa’s words coming back to haunt him. “You think the damned loa had her hooks in me this whole time? Marinette, is that the one?” 

“She doesn’t let go once she finds a suitable vehicle,” Sam says, and tears off a chunk of toast, scoops up some of the egg yolk. “Erzulie Freda knew what happened when you went to Stefanie’s, she got word to us so we’d know. Once you showed up downstairs, we knew a Petro was still hanging on to you, guessed it was Marinette. Erzulie’s a Rada, Marinette’s a Petro, so Erzulie had the right to hold Marinette responsible for Stefanie’s death; it was just a matter of getting Marinette somewhere where they could deal with her.” 

Dean licks his lips, says, “So you had them drug me, called out Marinette, and had some kind of trial? Look, Sam, I appreciate you getting her out of me, really, but was this all necessary? Couldn’t you have just exorcised me or something? Couldn’t you have warned me?” 

The eyes that look back at Dean, Sam’s eyes, are just as dark as Ati’s, just as deep as Lakwa’s, but they’re entirely Sam, full of regret and sorrow, with the same steely necessity that Dean’s used to seeing in his father’s eyes. 

“It was necessary,” Sam says. “Wish to Ayizan it wasn’t, but it was. It had to be done.” 

“You were _dead_,” Dean says, leaning towards his brother. 

Sam smiles, replies, “I’m ridden by _Baron Samedi_,” like it’s a valid argument. 

Dean mutters under his breath, but the thing is, Sam’s right. Being used as a horse for the loa of the dead has always given that person a sense of life and death not many others have; Dean remembers hearing horror stories about hunters going and killing the baron’s horse and then having to go back and do it again months later. Sam’s always had a more fluid idea of death, though, ever since he was a child, and now Dean’s wondering if his little brother has had the vévés in his head since then, heard the baron since infancy, or if this is something new. 

“So how do we get them out of you?” Dean asks, after a sip of chicory coffee, slightly sour, slightly bitter.

“You don’t,” Sam says, picking up his fork and knife again, cutting into his ham. He chews, swallows, and looks back at Dean, who’s holding his mug, not drinking. Sam sighs, says, “Dean.”

Dean shakes his head, thumps his mug down. “No, Sam. _No_. This is not acceptable.”

Sam meets Dean’s eyes and says, “This is not up to you.” 

\--

They eat in silence, and after Sam’s cleared the table, left the dishes to soak in the sink, Sam says, “Other than the loa, is there anything else you’d like to yell about?” 

Dean looks up, eyes narrowed, but there’s a grin playing at Sam’s lips, some semblance of humour in his words.

“Sam,” Dean growls, and Sam grins full-out, runs hands through his hair, stretches expansively.

“Oh, come on,” Sam says, teasing. “This life, Dean? It’s not bad. Sure, it’s complicated, but not any more than how we lived.”

Dean’s jaw drops, and he says, “Not bad? Sam, you stopped breathing last night. You’re possessed by loa, you’re some kind of, what, some kind of _houngon_, and you’re addicted to Rohypnol when the loa _aren’t_ in you. How is any of this good?” 

Sam laughs, says, “I have an apartment, friends, lovers. How is any of this bad?” 

The mention of lovers makes Dean’s mind flash back, stuck on the image of Sam, lying on his back as Théo and Sophie draped themselves over him, the slow slip-slide of Creole dripping from his lips, and he swallows hard, turns away. 

“Look, Dean,” Sam says, serious now, “we’ll just have to agree to disagree for now, okay? The loa, the vodou and hoodoo, it’s not gonna change any time soon, so if that’s all you’re gonna think about, then you should just leave and not come back when you’re done. I’m not going with you, and I don’t want you to waste your time arguing with me when you could be heading toward Missouri.” 

Dean turns back around, slowly, eyes wide as he stares at his brother. 

Sam shrugs, awkwardly scratches the back of his head, and says, “What?”

“Heading where?” Dean asks, voice cracking in the middle of the first word. 

“Mi—Dad didn’t tell you yet?” Sam asks, eyes narrowed in resigned disbelief. “What _did_ he tell you?” 

Dean sits back down, heavy, like the weight of his shock has settled in his bones. “He’s got a lead on the demon. Told me to come and get you, give him a call on the way out of Palo Alto, he’d tell us where to go.” 

Sam kneels down at Dean’s side, sinking to his knees in a slow movement that makes Dean shake his head. Sam must think it’s related to John’s instructions, because he doesn’t ask about it, just puts one hand on Dean’s knee and says, “It’s going to try and take another mother just south of a place called Eldon,” and Dean’s fighting to focus on what Sam’s saying, not the heat of his brother’s hand, so close to his dick. 

“There’s a gun, it’ll kill demons, but there needs to be three of you there for this to work,” Sam adds, and squeezes Dean’s knee before standing up, taking something out of his back pocket. 

He takes Dean’s hand, drops some sort of charm in Dean’s palm, and then bends down, kisses Dean’s temple. 

“Protection,” Sam murmurs. “It works better drawn on the skin, but I didn’t think you’d appreciate getting attacked by Sharpies. Loa protect you and Ayizan watch over you.” Sam kisses the centre of Dean’s forehead, and adds, softer, barely above a murmur, “Bondye bring you back to me.” 

Dean closes his eyes, curls his hand tight around the charm, and sits there, listening, as Sam leaves, goes downstairs. 

The apartment’s silent, noises from the café underneath coming through as a restrained hum, traffic from outside filtering in through open windows. Dean opens his hand after a few minutes, ignores the white lines where the edges of the charm have pressed into his skin, and studies the piece of metal he’s holding. The edges have been dulled so they won’t cut, and there’s a hole in the middle of the vaguely circular charm, the rest of the small piece covered in tendrils of etched lines, tangled up and curled together, on both sides. 

Dean gets chills looking at it, but he doesn’t hesitate to take off the necklace holding his amulet and slide the charm on as well. When he clasps it back around his neck, the amulet and the charm bounce off one another, the sound normal, average, but something about the noise, under it, maybe, makes Dean swallow hard, conjures up images of motel room, the inside of the Impala, Sam with his eyes closed, the feeling of lips pressed against Dean’s temple. 

He shakes it off, gets dressed, and leaves the apartment without looking back. As he’s walking through the café, Pierre presses a large brown paper bag with the top rolled down and over, into Dean’s hands. 

“Ogou strike your enemies,” he says, eyes gleaming, like he’d go with Dean given half the chance. “And don’t forget to eat.” 

Dean nods once, says, “Thanks,” slowly, cautiously, but Pierre just smiles and goes off to talk to one of the customers sitting near the back.


	3. Chapter 3

The Impala’s where he left it, and sliding in behind the wheel has Dean breathing a sigh of relief at the comfort, the familiarity. He sets the paper bag on the passenger seat next to him, pulls away, and can’t help driving past the café on his way out of the French Quarter, slowing down enough to look at the windows, not slow enough to make out the faces of anyone inside. Head aching, Dean drives away, out of San Francisco, Motorhead blaring, amulet and charm bouncing against each other with every pothole. 

He’s way outside of Palo Alto, in a small town called Bishop about forty miles from the Nevada border, before he pulls over and calls John. His father’s phone rings, and Dean leaves a message, not surprised to get voicemail. While he’s waiting for John to call back, Dean opens the paper bag and peers inside, sees a few plastic containers filled with things he can’t quite make out. 

Dean pulls out one and grins, surprised, seeing it stuffed to the brim with beignets squished into every square inch of space. The next is filled with rice, the third with gumbo, and the fourth with a couple cut-up pieces of leftover pecan pie. It seems a little like Théo, a little like Pierre, and as Dean’s pulling the lid off the beignets, he wonders if it was their idea or if it was Sam’s. 

The phone rings when his mouth’s full of pastry, and Dean can’t help rolling his eyes as he chews faster, grabbing his phone and pushing the button to talk just as he’s swallowing. 

“’Lo?” he asks without looking at the caller ID. White flakes of powdered sugar fall off of his mouth onto the steering wheel. 

“Dean, have you picked up your brother yet?” 

Dean grimaces, looking at the window, brushing sugar off of his lips with one thumb. “Dad, Sam’s not, he’s got other stuff. He’s not coming.” 

There’s silence for a moment, then John says, “Fine,” like he’s trying not to scream, trying not to let disappointment and worry and anger seep into his voice and fight there, out in the open, for dominance. “There’s a place south of Eldon, Missouri. You’ve got three days. I’ll try and find someone else to fill in the third.” He pauses, then asks, “He’s okay?”

Dean makes a face, says, “Yeah,” because apart from the loa, apart from the near-death experience, apart from the cracked up vodou shit Sam’s got going on, his brother’s not doing too bad for himself. “Can’t say I like how he’s doing it, but he’s doing.” 

John sighs, the sound echoing across the states between them, and says, “Three days, Dean. Drive safe,” before hanging up. 

Dean looks at the half of a beignet in his hand, then sighs, tosses it back in the Tupperware container, and starts driving toward Missouri.

\--

Next to John’s truck, there’s a classic, an El Camino that Dean raises an approving eyebrow at as he walks past. He knocks on the door to the motel room John texted him about last night, and steps back while he waits for someone to answer it. 

The guy who answers it is as tall as Dean, smirks while he looks Dean over and then says, “Who are you,” like he doesn’t know, like it isn’t written all over Dean’s face, his tired walk, the Impala parked in the lot. 

“Dean,” he replies, bristling, “and who the hell are you?” 

“Relax,” the guy says, opening the door and stepping out of the way, smirk fading into something halfway near an honest smile. “I’m Gordon Walker. Your dad called me up, said we had a demon. Not my usual monster, but I was close.”

Dean nods at that, slides inside, lets Gordon close the door behind him. “What _is_ your usual monster?”

“Vampires,” John says, coming out of the bathroom, rubbing a towel over his face. 

Dean blinks, looks at his father, then back at Gordon, who smirks, before turning back to John and asking, “Vampires? You’re kidding, right?” 

“Sometimes I wish I was,” Gordon says, “but I’m not. Now, are we gonna talk about what we’re doing tonight or am I excusing myself for a while so you two can talk about Sammy?” 

“It’s Sam,” Dean and John say at the same time.

Gordon holds up his hands, opens the door again and shoots them both a curious look before he gives them a mocking salute and slips out, shuts the door silently behind him. 

Dean turns, looks at his father, and says, “I don’t like him. Where’d you find him?” 

John sighs, tosses the hand towel back into the bathroom. “He’s a damn good hunter, Dean. Wavering on the edge of insanity, but aren’t we all? Tell me what happened when you went to get Sam.” 

“He’s living in San Francisco,” Dean says, sitting on the edge of one bed. “Downtown, in the French Quarter, above a café. Has a couple of roommates, keeps busy. I spent the night there, they had a party,” and he grins, gives a little laugh as he adds, “must’ve been good one, because I don’t remember much.” 

Nothing Dean says is a lie, exactly, but it’s a careful collection of half-truths and omissions forced out in as easy a tone as he can drum up. 

Still, John seems to buy it, sits down on the bed next to Dean, rubs his forehead. “He’s okay, Dean?” 

Dean breathes out, says, “Yes, sir. He’s okay,” and very carefully doesn’t think about whether that was a lie or a prayer. 

\--

They’re almost too late to save the mother; Dean blames it on Gordon but not out loud, not with Gordon holding a book of old rituals and walking into that kid’s nursery like seeing a woman on the ceiling doesn’t phase him one bit. Gordon reads, though, and Dean catches the mother as she falls to the ground, demonic power trapped by something that Dean thinks sounds Sumerian.

John comes in, then, holding a gun, and the demon says, “John,” lips shaping the name, giving it depth and passion in a dark, dangerous crooning lilt. 

Gordon gets the woman and her child downstairs, and Dean doesn’t like giving civilians to Gordon, not when the man’s obviously insane and carrying, but he wants to be here, needs to be here. 

“John _and_ Dean,” the demon says. “Now, if only Sam was here, our little reunion would be complete. Tell me, how _is_ Sam doing these days? Has he found his gift yet? His was the best out of all of the children I saw.” 

John doesn’t take his eyes off of the demon, not even at the last words, the mention of a gift, and the demon looks bored. It’s as if it’s looking to get a rise out of one or both of them, and with John pointing the gun, hands held easy around the grip, it won’t be him. 

The demon looks at Dean, then drops its eyes to the charm on Dean’s necklace, bouncing against the amulet. The demon smiles, and Dean’s throat goes dry. A crack of ozone, and John’s flying through the room, ends up pinned against a wall painted in yellow, the gun on the floor. Dean tosses holy water at the demon and smoke fills the room, but the demon’s stuck, doesn’t have anywhere to hide. 

“Your brother knows how to work powerful protection,” the demon says, yellow eyes locked on Dean, as Dean moves, reaches for the gun. “It’s almost like he’s here, instead of you, with that piece of tin around your neck. Do you know _how_ he’s able to do that?” 

Dean doesn’t answer. He aims and shoots, and watches as the bullet imbeds itself into the demon’s forehead, above those yellow eyes. Silver lightning spreads outward, inward, and the edges of the trapping spell catch pieces of fire and black smoke when the demon breaks apart. 

John sags, falling away from the wall, and catches himself on the corner of a dresser. “The hell was he talking about, Dean?” 

Dean looks down at the gun, licks his lips, and says, “I need to go back, let Sam know its over.”

“So call him,” John says, crossing the room and taking Dean’s necklace in hand, moving the amulet to study the charm. “What is this?” and Dean closes his eyes the moment he sees the first hints of recognition dawning in his father’s expression. “Dean, what is this.” 

“Sam gave it to me,” Dean says, and steps back, carefully. “I have to get back there, tell him what’s going on.”

Dean can hear Gordon’s footsteps outside, the way the floorboard’s creaking, but John’s asking him questions now, questions about Plaquemines Parish, about the loa and Sam and what kind of café Sam’s living above, what kind of party there was. He feels trapped, standing between two hunters, for the first time ever, wonders if this is why Sam left, this choking, clawing feeling that no one will understand, that they’re going to hurt him, that he’s going to _die_ if he stays here a moment longer.

He pushes past Gordon, goes outside and throws up in the bushes, one hand on the wall of the house to brace his body. When he stands up, Gordon’s nowhere to be seen and John’s waiting for an answer. 

“Tell me that your brother did not get mixed up with a bunch of voodoo witches,” John says, flatly. 

Dean looks at his father and can’t lie, not with the way John’s staring at him, so he doesn’t say anything at all, wipes off his mouth with the back of one hand instead. 

“Go back there and straighten this out,” John says. “Before word gets around, you get your brother out of whatever mess he’s in.” Dean opens his mouth to speak, to protest, but John cuts him off, says, “You’re supposed to protect him, Dean. Do it now, before another hunter finds out. You think it’s bad when hunters go after strangers, you don’t want to see what some of them’ll do to a hunter that switches sides.” 

Dean straightens up, feels his blood run cold as John’s words sink in, and he nods. “Yes, sir.” 

\--

He calls the café on his way back west—calls information first and takes down the number before the girl, pleasant voice, if a little tired, connects him. 

Pierre answers, and Dean says, “Hey, I’m on my way back for some beignets.”

There’s silence for a minute; Dean worries but then hears Pierre laugh, as if he’d been trying to hide it, and Pierre says, “We’ll have some made fresh. How long until you arrive?” 

Dean glances at his watch, then at the speedometer. “Two days, give or take. I. Is Sam there? I was kind of hoping to talk to him.”

“I sent Sophie up to get ‘im the second I heard your voice,” Pierre says. “He’ll be down in a second, but for future reference, lemme give you his cell number. You have paper?” 

By the time Dean’s got Sam’s number down, Pierre’s handing the phone over, and it’s the best sound Dean’s ever heard when his little brother says, “You’re on your way back?” 

“I’ll be there in two days,” Dean says. “Be careful, okay?”

Sam pauses, then asks, “Is that a general warning or in reference to something specific?” 

“Both.” Dean waits, listens, and then the voice crooning on the other end isn’t Sam. 

“We all gonna be careful, Dean Winchester, don’t you worry. Get here fast as you can, but don’t kill yourself on the way. Lakwa ain’t gonna be happy if he has to do something ‘bout you, too.” 

It’s a measure of relief, which provokes worry Dean doesn’t want to think about, when he answers Ati. “Yes, sir. I’m on my way.” 

After he hangs up, Dean thinks that maybe he should’ve asked if Ati was warning _him_, wonders about that ‘too’ and what it means, who else Lakwa’s been dealing with. He looks at the speedometer and pushes the Impala a little bit faster. 

\--

There’s a closed sign on the door of the café when Dean walks up, having left the Impala parked in an alley somewhere. He’s bound to get a ticket, maybe even towed, but he’d driven past the café first and the way the lights inside were out, the way the closed sign was swinging on the door when it should’ve been open and full to capacity, has him a little spooked, that and the itch between his shoulder-blades like something’s going down and he’s almost too late to join in. 

He bangs on the door, and someone upstairs peeks out through a window, yells down, “Dean? That you?” 

Dean looks up, sees Théo leaning out, over the edge, and even from this far away, he can see panic kept barely in-check written all over Théo’s face. 

“Yeah,” Dean calls back. “Someone gonna let me in or do I need to bust the door down?” 

Before Théo can answer, Dean sees someone moving through the café, and he backs up enough to let Pierre open the door for him. 

“What’s going on?” Dean asks, as Pierre pulls him inside then shuts and locks the door again. “Pierre, come on, what the hell’s happening?” 

“_Merde_, that’s what,” Pierre mutters, and Dean hears anger in Pierre’s words, anger and an accent coaxed out by emotion running high. It’s not made any better when Dean gets close enough to see the bruises forming on Pierre’s face, around his eye and high on his cheekbone. “Trouble. Come on, Dean. Baron’s been waiting for you.”

Dean doesn’t like the sound of that, not at all, but he takes the steps two at a time and blinks when he sees the door at the top in pieces, like someone kicked it down. He turns the corner and stops, has to be pushed to one side by Pierre, who brushes past him and stands next to his brother. 

“Dean Winchester, I never thought you’d be part of something like this,” Gordon spits out, twisting in his chair, struggling in vain to get free of the ropes tying his wrists and ankles to the wood. From the looks of his wrists under the rope, he’s been trying for a while, managed to get the rope bloody and his wrists are going to sting like hell until they heal up. He’s not wearing a shirt, looks all banged up, like he’s gone eight rounds with a mean son of a bitch.

Dean’s eyes flick to Pierre, the bruises on Pierre’s face, then back to Gordon. “A part of something like what?” Dean asks. 

Before Gordon can answer, Sam comes walking out of the hallway, rubbing a towel over his hair. It’s clear he’s just come from the shower, and when Sophie follows him a split-second later, Dean wonders if they were in there together, wonders what his brother looks like wet and naked, water running down his body in rivulets, hair plastered to his forehead, his neck, eyelashes dripping, clumped together, mouth shining.

Dean swallows, looks away, then looks back, takes in the black Sam’s wearing, head to bottom, and sighs, turns back to Gordon, because dealing with Gordon has to be easier than dealing with Baron La Croix. 

“You were listening when Dad I were talking, and you saw the charm, put two and two together, that right?” Dean asks. “Gordon, man, you’re a real piece of work, aren’t you.” 

Gordon scowls, says, “Dean, it’s not your brother anymore. Whichever of the damned loa are inside of him, they’ll never let go. Sam’s dead, gone, was the first time it happened. Now all we can do is set his body free. You know he’d want that, if he was here.” 

“Boy ain’t wantin’ nothing from you,” Sam says, and Dean hears Lakwa, sees Lakwa in Sam’s eyes when slanted eyes, large pupils, glance his way, nod at him. 

Dean nods back, licks his lips, and steps to the side. Gordon bares his teeth when Sam drops to the floor in front of him, sitting cross-legged. Sophie and Théo kneel on either side of him, and Dean watches, keeping an eye on the knife in Sophie’s hand, the gun in Théo’s. 

“You been here three hours, chile,” Lakwa says, focused on Gordon. “Three hours, and you ain’t even be asking us why we got you tied up, what we gonna do ‘bout you, nothing. Either you be pretty sure you’re gonna get out of those ropes or you ain’t thinking we gonna do anything ‘bout you. Which is it?”

Gordon spits at Lakwa, hits him square on the cheek, and even as Dean’s moving forward, Théo leans up, smacks Gordon, hard. When Théo sits back on his heels, Dean sees blood dripping out of Gordon’s nose. 

“Watch yourself, hunter,” Théo says, and, for the first time, Dean hears Théo’s voice fill and echo with danger. It doesn’t sound like him, not at all, and when Dean sees Pierre’s muscles tense, he guesses. 

Sam’s being ridden, Théo’s being ridden, Sophie probably is as well, Dean guesses, guesses until he hears her talk and knows for sure that she is. 

“You disrespect our _chwal_, you disrespect us,” she says, and Dean shudders at the sound of her voice, smoky and raspy, ruffling through his hair and veins, burning low in his stomach and spiralling through his muscles. “Tell us why you here, causing _dezòd_, all this mess. Just to kill the boy?” 

“He was a hunter,” Gordon growls. “He was a hunter, and you’ve perverted him. He was weak, he let you in, he doesn’t deserve to live. Since I can’t kill you, I might as well kill him and rid the world of one more of your kind.” 

Dean can only stare at Gordon, the madness threatening to break apart in his eyes, madness and self-assurance, that he’s doing the right thing, that _killing Sam_ is the right thing. 

Gordon looks at Dean, pins his eyes on Dean, and says, “He isn’t Sam. Letting him live, you’re no better.” 

Dean freezes, and the room’s held in tableau; for a long, never-ending moment, no one moves, no one says anything, it seems like no one’s breathing. 

Lakwa shudders and stands up, Sophie and Théo doing the same a moment later. Lakwa turns, and Dean narrows his eyes, because, for a moment, he thinks it’s Sam, except words are spilling from Sam’s throat and there’s no way Sam would ever say what Dean’s hearing. 

“We’ll have to kill him. If we let him go, he’ll only bring more hunters, and we can’t make him forget, not with her touch on him.” 

Dean gapes as Théo asks, “During ritual? We can hold him long enough to call a gathering.” 

Sam, because it _is_ Sam, has to be, sounds like him, looks back at Gordon, who’s glaring and trying to get out of his ropes again. “No,” Sam says. “His blood would only taint us.” 

“Sam,” Dean says, because he can’t _not_ say something, not in the face of what Sam’s proposing. “Sam, he’s a hunter.” 

Sophie holds out her knife as Théo holds out his gun. Sam looks at the knife, strokes it, but shakes his head, lets his fingers rest on Sophie’s wrist for a moment. He looks at Dean and says, “No, he isn’t. He’s a danger to everyone he’s around and a danger to himself,” and moves to stand behind Gordon. 

“You gonna let your baby brother do this to me?” Gordon asks, quiet and still as Sam tilts Gordon’s head back, lets his hands caress Gordon’s neck, stroke their way over skin and behind ears, down Gordon’s neck and smoothing over his shoulders. Dean sees Gordon tense, shiver, but Gordon asks, “You gonna let him kill me in cold blood for speaking the truth?” 

Dean opens his mouth, tries to move, but nothing comes out, his feet won’t work. He pushes harder, and Théo, in front of him and facing him, smiles. 

“Don’t bother,” he says. “Pierre’s a bokò. You aren’t going anywhere.” 

Dean’s eyes widen, move from Théo to Sam as his brother leans down, looks as if he’s going to whisper in Gordon’s ear but speaks loud enough for everyone to hear him. “When you killed your sister, she wasn’t fully gone yet.” 

Dean doesn’t understand, but Gordon turns white. 

“She could have been saved, if you would’ve waited. There’s a trick to it, Gordon, one you were too busy killing to learn.” 

“You’re lying,” Gordon breathes, eyes blank, the craziness in them growing, splitting apart and multiplying. “You’re _lying_, you _are_.” 

Sam runs one hand over Gordon’s head, closes his eyes, says, “My oath to _le gran met_, I’m not,” and grabs hold of Gordon’s neck, twists. The sound of a neck snapping echoes through the room, and Dean’s left standing there as everyone else moves. 

Pierre disappears into the back hallway, sounds like he’s making phone calls, and he’s on a cell phone when he comes back out and leans against the wall, and Théo’s doing something in the kitchen, whistling. Sophie comes back from the bedroom and she’s carrying a needle, bends down and injects whatever was in there into Gordon’s arm, Gordon, whose eyes are already blank, dead. 

“What did you do,” Dean whispers, and Pierre shoves a chair under him just as his knees collapse. “Sam, what did you do?” 

Sam looks up from where he’s kneeling next to Gordon, untying the rope from the body, eyes too old, too knowing, shoulders bowed under with responsibility, with weight, with expectation. 

“What I had to,” Sam says, and his voice is strong, self-assured, steely. 

It sounds like John. 

\--

Almost worse, it’s like they’ve done this before. Sophie’s injected Gordon’s body with something and Pierre’s called a couple people, asked them to come and pick up the body. Dean asks how they’re going to get rid of him, and Sam looks at him as if Dean should know better. 

“They’re going to take him outside of the city and burn him,” Sam says. “I’ve never seen someone more likely to come back as a vengeful spirit otherwise. Have you?” 

“Then why bother with the Rohypnol?” Dean asks. 

Sam frowns, looks like he’s confused, but then his expression clears. “What Sophie injected him with, it wasn’t ro. We wouldn’t waste it like that.” 

Dean asks what it was, but Sam doesn’t answer. 

\--

With Gordon’s body gone and everything cleaned up, the apartment looks like it did the first time Dean came up here, everything in its place, Sam sitting in a leather armchair, Sophie perched on his lap with her arms around his neck like she can’t bear to let go. Sam’s running a hand up and down her back, has the other on Théo’s knee, where he’s sitting on the arm rest. 

Dean’s coming out of the kitchen carrying a beer, and he asks, “So what now? Your loa have anything to say about what the hell’s gonna happen now?” 

Sophie’s hold on Sam tightens and she lets out a silent little sob. 

“Actually, they did,” Sam says, and Dean can’t help the expression that crosses his face. It makes Sam smile, just a little. “It’s too dangerous for me to stay here. I need to go down to Louisiana, see some people there.”

“He told us we can’t come,” Théo murmurs, eyes bloodshot, shining with unshed tears. “He told us to stay here.” 

Dean nods, once, and understands why Sophie’s so distraught, why Théo’s shaking. Sam doesn’t look upset, though. 

As if he hears what Dean’s thinking, Sam says, “It needs to be done,” like that’s the end of the story, and it might well be for these people, but not for Dean. 

“I’m coming with you,” Dean says. 

“I hoped you might drive,” Sam replies, and there’s a hint of a question in those eyes, one asked three years ago that’s still waiting for an answer.

Dean exhales, scratches the back of his head, and Sam’s eyes are closing off when Dean finally says, “Yeah, ‘course I will. Someone has to keep an eye on you, right?” 

“I’ll pack some food,” Théo murmurs, but he doesn’t make a move to get up. Instead, he sinks down into the chair, onto Sam’s lap, on top of Sophie, and puts his face in Sam’s neck, crying. 

Sam meets Dean’s eyes, then looks down at the two on his lap, closes his eyes and starts murmuring in Creole. Soothing, crooned words fill the air, and Pierre touches Dean’s arm, draws him away from the three, back into the kitchen. 

Dean sits down, nursing his beer, and says, “You don’t seem too upset.” 

It’s a casual observation, and Pierre doesn’t disagree as he takes Tupperware out of the cabinets, some pots and covered dishes out of the fridge. 

“I’m not part of the trinity,” he says. “For them to be split up, _merde_. My brother’s gonna be useless for days, but at least he’ll have Sophie. Sam might be putting on a brave face, but if he don’t feel the pain of this either, I’ll eat my hat.” 

“You’re not wearing one,” Dean points out. 

Pierre smiles, starts moving food around, transferring it from dish to dish, long, slender fingers agile, quick. “He’s changed since he’s been here, Dean Winchester. He’s still Sam, but he ain’t entirely the Sam you remember. Keep that in mind.” 

Dean nods, resists the urge to bridle at someone telling him how to behave around his brother, and asks, instead, “A trinity?” because he doesn’t know what the term means in this context. 

“Three loa, one in each horse, working in concert,” Pierre says, focused on the food, not on Dean. “It’s rare, more because of the humans than the loa, so we treasure it when a trinity comes along. Your brother, he’s the head of the strongest trinity we’ve had in some time, and tearing them apart, mm, it won’t be pretty. People’ll be talking, Dean.” 

Pierre shakes his head, clearly done with explanations, and Dean nods once, thoughtful, and finishes his beer. 

\--

Théo’s packed a basket full of food, shoved plastic containers into every space available, and then disappeared into the bedroom, door clicking closed behind him. Sophie’s sitting on the couch in the living room, eyes vacant, staring at the opposite wall as if she’s not aware of anything else. Pierre’s downstairs, giving instructions to the people getting rid of Gordon’s body, and Sam, Dean’s not sure what Sam’s doing. 

He stands up, meanders around the apartment, finds Sam in the bathroom, door open. Sam’s shirtless, is using a red Sharpie to draw symbols down his chest, on top of some of the tattoos, turning and twining inside of them, and when Dean peeks his head in, looks in the mirror to see what Sam’s doing, Sam meets his eyes, wry, amused. 

“Don’t worry,” he says, nearly a drawl, hints of the South in his voice, picked up from being around the others here, Dean thinks. “It’s nothing except some protection. Minor stuff, but it’ll keep me under the radar while we’re crossing territory.” 

“Territory?” Dean asks, curious to know what Sam means. 

Sam’s smile grows even as it turns sad, melancholic. “There’s a lot you don’t know about the people that practice vodou and hoodoo, Dean. Bondye believe me when I say I wish you won’t learn anything, either.” 

Sam turns, and the light spills over him in a different way, his jeans are slung lower on his hips than normal, something, because, for a split second, Dean sees the reflection of a scar in the mirror. He spins Sam, lets his eyes and fingers fall over a line that runs for four inches just below his hip, white and smooth, something he must have seen before but passed off as being one of the tattoos. 

“Knife fight?” Dean asks, voice quiet. 

Sam meets his eyes, says, just as quietly, “Hunter,” and turns away. 

Dean’s throat closes up, but he can’t help asking, “What happened to him?” 

“I killed him,” Sam says, and puts his shirt on. “He wasn’t the first and I doubt he’ll be the last.” 

Pierre knocks on the door, says something to Sam in Creole that has Sam muttering curses and running out of the bathroom. Dean moves to follow, but Pierre puts a hand on Dean’s chest, keeping him in place for a moment. 

“He’ll take care of it,” Pierre says, and his eyes are too amused. “Were you likin’ what you saw?” he asks, tone full of ‘_I told you so_.’ “Want me to ask one of the loa to ride him so you can fuck him without feeling guilty?” Pierre gets a little closer, lets his fingers curl into Dean’s shirt, lets his nails snag the fabric, and he says, low and humid, “Would it count if he wasn’t the one asking for it or doesn’t it matter, so long as it be his body? You’re far too guilty for a man who lives the life you do, Dean Winchester. Shuck off some of that conscience you carrying around and _live_ a little.” 

Dean bats Pierre’s hand away, glares at the man, and sees Sam leading Sophie into the bedroom where Théo disappeared earlier and closing the door behind him. Dean scowls at the closed door, then scowls at Pierre, who just smiles and puts his hand back on Dean’s chest, strokes downward. 

“You want I should help with that?” Pierre asks, and looks downwards, raises an eyebrow. 

Dean follows his gaze, and even as he’s looking at the bulge in his jeans, suddenly aware that he’s hard and aching, soft noises filter out from the bedroom. Dean growls, honest-to-God growls, and pushes Pierre away, stalks out into the living room. As he walks past the door, all he can hear is Sam’s voice, crooning like Ati, and the sweat-slick slide of skin against skin against skin. 

“_Chere mo lemme t'oi._”

\--

Théo and Sophie don’t come out of the bedroom, though Sam does, fifteen minutes later, tear tracks dried salty on his cheeks, chin held high. He’s carrying a duffel and a smaller box, wooden, and looks at Dean, says, “I’m ready. Let’s go.” 

“You wanna,” Dean says, but Sam cuts him off. 

“Let’s go,” and there’s steel under the near pleading tone. 

Dean nods, takes the duffel from Sam, and leads his brother outside. Sam stops on the sidewalk outside of the café, looks up at the window, runs a hand over the name painted onto the door, and then inhales, squares his shoulders, and starts walking. 

Dean watches, but Sam never turns around, never looks back. 

“Sam,” he says, when they’re walking into the lot.

“Not right now, Dean,” Sam says, and Dean looks over, sees his brother’s jaw clenching and unclenching, sees Sam swallow, and doesn’t say another word. 

Sam smiles when he sees the Impala, rests a hand on the trunk before Dean opens it, thumb rubbing back and forth. “Should’ve known you still had this,” he says. 

Dean gives his brother a look, one that says, ‘_You expected something else? Are you crazy?_’ 

Sam laughs. “Yeah, fair enough. Still, you’ve had her a while, Dean. Ever thought about trading up?” 

“We’re not related,” Dean mutters, and runs his hand over the Impala as he moves from trunk to door. “Don’t listen to him, girl. He’s crazy, you know that.” 

Sam rolls his eyes, but he sighs once he sits down, sighs and knocks his knees against the glove box, adjusts the seat, makes himself at home.

Dean’s stomach aches to see it. 

They’re barely out of the parking lot when Sam says, “If you’d rather not get involved,” trailing off and leaving it there. 

Dean doesn’t even look, just reaches over and smacks Sam’s head. “Tell me the fastest way to get out of this damn city,” he says. “And don’t touch the radio. Driver picks the music, shotgun shuts his cakehole.” 

Sam snorts, pulls out the box of tapes from under the seat and rifles through them, an action Dean remembers, pulling out one and offering it to Dean. “Zeppelin?” 

Dean chews on his lower lip for a minute, trying to decide whether to accept the peace offering or to emphasise his point, but he eventually nods, says, “Sounds good,” and lets _Zeppelin II_ ease them out of the city.


	4. Chapter 4

They stop for the night outside of Coalinga, close to the highway. Dean gets a room with two queen beds, and the sound of trucks on the highway serves as a somewhat soothing lull in the background of the heater going, the drone of a television next door. 

Sam slings his duffel on the floor between the beds, looks at both and then asks, “Which one?” 

Dean’s about to call his brother an idiot because Dean always takes the bed closer to the window and door, but he stops himself in time, reminds himself that it’s been three years, that Sam’s just left the two people he’s used to sleeping with and doesn’t know when he’ll see them again, if ever. “I’ll take this one,” he says, sitting on the one near the door. “Unless the mattress is lumpy.” Dean feels around, shrugs, says, “Yeah. I’ll take this one. You want the shower?” 

“No,” Sam says. “Go ahead. You’ve been driving all day.”

Dean nods in thanks, grabs some clean clothes, and goes into the bathroom. 

He comes out half an hour later, towel wrapped around his head, and stops. Sam’s sitting cross-legged on the floor, holding a small drum in his lap, fingers tapping out a rhythm on the edges. Sam’s facing southeast, and when Dean looks at his brother, he sees that Sam’s eyes are closed, that Sam’s breathing deep and even, looks like he’s meditating. 

Dean doesn’t say anything, just moves around Sam, puts on his shoes, rubs the towel over his hair, and goes out in search of food and beer. 

\--

When Dean gets back, Sam’s lying in bed, asleep, light from the parking lot coming in past the blinds and casting odd shadows on Sam’s body. Dean stands in the doorway for a moment, staring at the tattoos on Sam’s back, before Sam turns over, mumbles something under his breath. 

Dean steps inside, closes the door and kicks off his shoes, takes off his jacket, wrinkles his nose at the smell of beer on his clothes. He debates a trip to the bathroom for one last piss before bed, but instead collapses on the mattress, shifts when he finds a lump just under his ass, and falls asleep on his side, staring at Sam’s face, the curve of Sam’s chin, the way Sam’s chest rises with every inhale, the sheet bunched around his waist, waistband of his pyjama bottoms peeking out. 

\--

Two days later, they’re driving around the edges of Baton Rouge. Sam’s said they need to go to Ascension Parish, and Dean was about ready to remind his brother that Ascension’s bayou land, swamp country, but Sam used a Sharpie and drew on his hands that morning, can see something that Dean can’t, looking out the windows. The way Sam says it, ‘Ascension,’ it sounds French, not English, four syllables with the heat of the South, sprawled out loose and lazy, and hearing it, seeing Sam sitting so still in the passenger side, it makes Dean’s skin crawl. 

They get off of I-10 and hang a right; Dean drives as far as he can on that road, then hangs another right when the road ends. 

“Bluff Road,” Dean reads, right off the sign, and though this isn’t following a cliff or mountain, it runs along the curve of the swamp, just as dangerous. 

“Turn right,” Sam says. “There’ll be a street, Rue Lamont, on the right. There’s one house. That’s where we need to be.” 

Dean doesn’t ask how Sam knows this, but he can’t resist looking over at his brother. Sam’s tense, stock-still, doesn’t look like he’s much looking forward to this meeting. Sam mentioned the parish first a day ago, halfway through Texas, and Dean’s not sure why they’re here first, but if Sam doesn’t want to be, they don’t _have_ to be. 

“You sure?” Dean asks, and when Sam looks at him, something flickers in the back of Sam’s eyes. 

“Yeah,” Sam says, whisper-quiet. “And when we get there, it’d be best if you waited in the car.” 

Dean drives, doesn’t say anything else, but when he pulls up in front of the house and parks, turns the Impala off, he gets out of the car as well. 

Sam looks at him and sighs but doesn’t argue. “Whatever you do, don’t react,” is all he says, before he’s striding up the sidewalk toward the front porch. 

The house looks normal from the outside, one story ranch with curtains fluttering in a mid-morning breeze, the smell of pie drifting out from the kitchen. Dean moves to step on to the porch and freezes, has lifted his foot to step up but can’t put it down. Sam, on the porch, looks back and sighs, rolls his eyes, and points at the car. 

“What?” Dean asks. 

The door behind Sam opens and the woman standing in the doorway has her hands on her hips, over the drawstrings of an apron. 

“What’re you doing bringing someone like that here?” she snips. 

Dean’s jaw drops, and he says, “Listen, lady,” before she cuts him off. 

“I wasn’t talking to you. Now go on, get yourself back in that car like the _poto mitan_ told you, and listen to him next time.” 

“_Maman_,” Sam says, softly. “I was the same way when I first came here. Please, for me?”

She huffs, says, “You could at least plant both your feet on the first step. He’s got blood of your kind and my kind on his hands and he did it willingly, went out searching. You really think I’m gonna let someone like him into my house? _Tue es fou_, Sam.” 

Sam squares his shoulders, says, “He’s one of my kind, _maman_. Not anymore, the trinity kicked out his rider, but he knows what it feels like, what it is.”

“If he’s _bosal_, then you better keep an eye on him, _poto mitan_.” Dean watches as Sam stares the woman down, then Dean flinches when she looks at him, studying him. “Well, all right,” she finally says, reluctantly. She bends down, spits on the porch, and gives Dean a sharp, piercing look. “You behave, boy. Don’t think I won’t throw you out if I have to,” she says, before turning around and going inside, leaving the door open behind her. 

Sam grins, says, “That was easier than I thought. Come on, Dean.” 

Dean lifts up one foot, and this time he doesn’t have any trouble stepping on to the porch. 

“How’d that work?” he asks, following Sam into the house, raising his eyebrow at the line of red dust just outside the front doorway. 

“Foot-track magic,” Sam replies, leading Dean through a nice, classy living room into the kitchen. “Snake lines under the steps, five-spots to settle. Don’t touch anything.” 

Dean doesn’t say that he won’t, just follows Sam. The house, it’s wide open and airy, wind chimes fluttering in front of some of the windows, but it’s creepy as well, everything too perfect, too clean. He sits on a chair just inside the kitchen once Sam nods at it, looking around, and Sam sits at the table, hands on his lap, watching the woman. 

Red curls bounce on her neck as she moves, pale cheeks flushed when she opens the oven and takes out a sheet of cookies. She sets the sheet on top of the stove, gets back to kneading some dough on the counter near the sink, turning her head to look at Sam. 

“Well? Tell me why you’re back, child. I’m sure the story’s good, ‘specially if you ain’t got the other two draping themselves all over you.” 

Sam takes a deep breath, then tells her, “Loa told me to leave. Things’ve been getting too tight. We’d been tossing around the idea, but then we kicked one of the Petro out of a horse she hijacked and had to kill a hunter who’d gotten too close.” 

She stops, fingertips stuck in dough, flour on her elbows, scattered over her arms, and looks at Sam. 

“Thought I heard something going on over by the lake. Which one was it? You held a trial?” she asks. “Explains the drawings. You run through any trouble on your way down here?” 

“No,” Sam replies. “A little in Texas, but the baron saw us through,” which is news to Dean. “And it was Marinette.”

She takes that in, then shakes her head, gets back to kneading dough. “Marinette’s bound to be upset with you, Sam. Her and her people both. Did you at least get rid of the horse? If she hijacked him once, she’ll do it again. You know she’ll be back in it if she can find it.” 

Dean freezes, and he almost doesn’t hear when Sam says, “She won’t be back in him,” steel under the velvet-coated purr. 

“Why not?” she asks, turning away completely from the dough lying on the counter. “What’s stopping her?” 

Sam bares his teeth, says, “I am.” 

“That’s only gonna work if,” she starts to say, then stops, narrows her eyes. She settles that gaze on Sam, then lets her eyes slide over to Dean. “You, boy,” she says, pointing at him. “What’s your name?” 

“Dean,” he says after a minute, after looking at Sam to see if it’s all right to answer truthfully. “Sam’s older brother.” 

She tilts her head, looks at Sam but then back at Dean, and breathes out, “Ayah. You didn’t even know. A loa like Marinette, uninvited, and you couldn’t tell.” 

“He wasn’t exactly looking for it, _maman_,” Sam says, coming to Dean’s defence. “And she didn’t make herself known, only took over once, and even that was in something he was still going to do. She just,” he says, pausing, searching for words, “she just amped it up a little.”

She looks at Dean longer, then back at Sam, and says, “Danny in there, too? Have to be, wouldn’t she, now that you left your girl back in Cali. I wanna talk to her, ask her what the hell she’s thinking, letting you go running around half-cocked like.” Sam’s shaking his head before she even trails off, and she sighs, says, “Well, ain’t this a _putain de bordel._.” 

“What’s your name?” Dean asks, as she goes back to kneading dough, tearing it apart and forming it into balls, dropping them onto another cookie sheet. 

“People around here call me _la sorcière_,” she says. 

Sam snorts, but when Dean looks at his brother, Sam shakes his head. “She’s not a witch, Dean. She works hoodoo, but that’s folk magic, not sorcery.” 

“M’name’s Lissa,” she says. “And I don’t want you calling me nothing else, not until you’ve earned it, y’hear me?” 

Dean’s response is automatic. “Yes, ma’am.” 

\--

She cooks while Sam talks and Dean listens to all of it, though he doesn’t understand more than a few things. Lissa hums when Sam tells her about the trial, clucks her tongue when Sam mentions what happened with Gordon. With her rolls in the oven and the counter cleaned up, she takes out a loaf from a bread-bin at the end of the counter and cuts thick slices, cooks up a couple grilled cheese sandwiches for Sam and Dean, serves them up with milk and potato chips. 

Sam looks up from his plate, gives Dean a half-smile, and Dean wonders if Sam remembers all those times John left them alone, all those times they ate grilled cheese for dinner, night after night, just like there was cereal every morning and Spaghetti-Os for lunch, weekend meals. 

“What’d you come to me for, then?” Lissa asks once the two have finished eating and are attacking thick slices of rich chocolate cake. “I ain’t one of yours, Sam.” 

“No, but you know what’s going on down here,” Sam says once he swallows, wipes stray crumbs from the corners of his mouth. “Some of the _houngons_ and _mambos_ have been dying off over the past few weeks. I know that, and I know which ones, and I know what the loa have done about it, but I don’t know what I’ll be getting myself into if I start calling gatherings to discuss Marinette.” 

Lissa nods, bites her lower lip while she thinks. Dean puts his fork down, knowing now that his actions, the killings, they’re making trouble for Sam, they were people Sam knew. He’s split, trying to decide how he feels about it; on one hand, they were vodouisantes, they deserved to be hunted, killed, but on the other, they were Sam’s friends, colleagues at the very least, and the people he met thanks to Sam, they’re not so bad, maybe the others weren’t, either. 

“They all know it was a hunter,” she says, looking at Sam, though her eyes flick to Dean quickly, guiltily. “They ain’t keen on getting together in one place, though they would for the _poto mitan_. They _really_ ain’t keen on outsiders right now, not with everything so up in the air. _Asogwe_ Stefanie gone and Erzulie’s favourite horse in Cali, a couple _sur points_ dead without leaving their _konesans_.” 

She trails off, shakes her head, and says, “You wanna call gatherings, I’d start with the Rada. Let ‘em calm everyone down. You call the Petro together, you gonna be having a battle on your hands real quick, ‘specially with Marinette up in arms.” 

Sam nods, puts his fork down and picks up crumbs from the plate using his thumb. “Baron says the guédé are fine, their horses doing all right. All I’ll have to worry about are the Rada and the Petro vodouisantes.”

Lissa snorts, says, “_All_ you’ll have to worry about? Honey-child, either you’re being optimistic, or you’re crazy. All you’ll have to worry about,” she mutters again, shaking her head. 

Dean looks back and forth between them, Lissa muttering as she clears off the table, puts the dishes in the sink and starts to wash, Sam grinning even while his eyes look thoughtful, making plans and preparations. 

“_Maman_,” Sam says. 

Lissa lifts a hand, dripping with soap suds, stopping Sam before he can get any further. “Go ahead. Just not the lake tonight, ayah? I’ve got things brewing, don’t want no Rada-ridden traipsing around my things.”

Sam stands up, moves across the kitchen in a few quick strides, leans down and kisses Lissa on the cheek. “Not tonight,” he agrees mildly, before walking out of the kitchen. 

Dean gets up to follow, but Lissa must see the reflection in the window, because she doesn’t turn around to say, “Not you, boy. You stay here with me and let your brother make his phone calls. It shouldn’t take long to start the _hountogi_.”

“The what?” Dean asks, settling back into his chair, keeping an eye on the woman. 

“The drummers,” Lissa replies, tilting her head as if she’s listening to something. “Sam’s putting out a call for meetin’s. They’ll pass the message along for him, so he don’t have to spend the next two days on the phone.” 

Dean nods, distracted, while he thinks. From what Lissa just said, it would take two days to arrange a meeting with two thirds of the vodou practitioners in this area, and he thought he’d struck a real blow by killing _nine_ of them. His throat dries up at the thought, that there are more than anyone ever knew about, dozens more waiting in the wings, and he only feels the slightest bit guilty about his part in thinning the numbers. 

Still, he’s not comfortable with that, because he didn’t feel any guilt when he was on his way to San Francisco, to pick up Sam. Things have changed, and changed quickly, and Dean’s not at all sure that he likes it. 

“What’s Sam, that he can do this?” Dean asks. “The way everyone’s so concerned about him, that they’ll jump the second he snaps his fingers.” 

Lissa pauses, then rinses whatever she was washing, grabs a towel and dries her hands as she turns to look at Dean. “He ain’t told you?” she asks, almost like she doesn’t believe that. “Even with you being a killer, you a horse, too, and he didn’t say nothing?” 

Dean shakes his head. 

“Ayah,” Lissa sighs. “Well, I’ll tell you this. What they call him, the _poto mitan_, that ain’t all he is,” she says. “Next time you talk to the baron, you ask him what it means, and then you ask him about _zo regleman_, see what he tells you. ‘S’better than me going ‘round and spilling secrets that ain’t mine to spill.” 

\--

They leave when Sam comes back, looking older than his years, like the weight of a thousand people rests on his shoulders. Lissa raises an eyebrow, and Sam says, “Not tonight. People’ll be coming ‘round tomorrow and for the next few days, though. Any chance you could ward the road in?” 

Lissa clucks her tongue, says, “O’course I will, child. And here,” she says, going over to a drawer at the far end of the kitchen, pulling out a small red flannel bag. Sam opens his mouth to argue when he sees it, but she narrows her eyes and presses it into his hand. “Ain’t no use arguing, Sam. I threw sticks yesterday, and you know you get a new one every time I see you.” 

Sam takes the bag, slides it into his pocket, and leans up, kisses Lissa’s cheek. “_Merci, maman_,” he whispers. 

Her fingers stroke his cheek, his jawline, run through his hair, like she’s memorising the feel of him, smiling slightly, sadly. “Be careful Sam. _Ne tue personne à moins que tu doives._”

\--

Once they get into the Impala, Dean asks, “You speak Creole _and_ French?” trying to sound as if it doesn’t bother him as much as it does. Finding out all of these things about Sam, just when he thinks he has a handle on his brother, it’s like having the door to a place shut right in his face when he’s trying to walk through it. 

“_Maman_, Lissa, she’s French,” Sam says, buckling his seat-belt. “When I stayed with her, that’s all she spoke. Drove me crazy at first, but it’s a good way to learn a language. The Creole came later.” 

Dean hums, listening, and turns the car on, backs out of Lissa’s driveway. “Where to?” he asks, looking over at his brother. 

“Nothing’s happening until tomorrow afternoon,” Sam says with a shrug. “As far as I’m concerned, we can find a motel with a bar nearby and drink until we get thrown out, then go back and sleep half the day away.” 

“Things went that good, huh,” Dean asks, pulling back onto Bluff Road, heading down towards Dutchtown. It doesn’t sound like something Sam would say, even this new Sam.

“Pretty much,” Sam says, and then falls into silence. 

Dean looks over at Sam again, decides not to try breaking the look on his brother’s face, popping in some Robert Johnson instead. Sam snorts the second he hears guitar strings being plucked.

“Hey,” Dean says. “When in Rome, right? Isn’t that what you always used to say?” 

Sam’s smile, the beginnings of one, wipes itself away at that, and he looks out the window, says, “Yeah. Yeah, it was.” 

\--

They grab a room halfway to Saint Gabriel, nice big place, almost an old plantation home, _Ciel et Chanson_. Sam silently points out brick dust around the doorways, five-spots etched into things, the way five boards on the porch look different, the way the tiles just inside the door are patterned. Dean feels his skin crawl, being around all of this hoodoo, but Sam walks in as if it doesn’t bother him, and maybe it doesn’t. 

Dean lets Sam deal with checking in, it goes easier than Dean expected, and they’re given a room on the second floor, decorated nice but not too girly, big and spacious, two beds, sitting area to one side. Sam drops his duffel on the floor by the window, leans and looks out before he looks down. Dean sees him swipe his finger across the sill, and frowns when Sam’s tongue darts out to taste what’s on his fingertip. 

His own stuff forgotten, Dean goes over, looks at the windowsill and narrows his eyes, seeing red dust, black dust, and salt, mixed together. 

“An old house,” Sam says, eyes distant, gazing out over the back yard, one that butts up against bayou. “This is an old house with an older history. It would be good to keep that in mind, Dean.” 

Shivers run up and down Dean’s back, and he asks, “What’s that supposed to mean?” 

Sam shakes his head, seems to shake himself out of whatever trance he was in, and he looks at Dean, eyes deep, too knowing. “Don’t go anywhere without me,” he says, and then starts taking clothes out of his duffel. 

“What the hell is that supposed to mean?” Dean asks, following his brother after one last look out of the window. “Is there something going on here I should know about?”

“No,” Sam says, forceful. “Nothing. Just don’t go anywhere outside of this house without me.” 

Dean purses his lips but nods, because Sam’s the expert on all of this, knows what it all means, and even if Dean would like a hell of a lot more explanation than that, he knows he isn’t going to get it.

\--

Dean drives to a bar and the two Winchesters sit inside and drink until the place closes, two or three in the morning, Dean’s not sure. Sam’s a little less drunk, switched to water an hour or so before, so he drives them back to the house. 

“What’s that mean?” Dean asks, eyes fuzzy, nowhere close to being sober. Sam gives him a look, a raised eyebrow, and Dean adds, “The name of the house.” 

“_Ciel et Chanson_,” Sam murmurs, and Dean smiles lazily, aware of but not encouraging the heat swimming through his veins as he listens to his brother speak French. “Sky and Song,” Sam says. “A good name. Hopeful. The people reflect it.” 

Dean nods, feeling like his head and stomach are sloshing with all the liquid he drank, and doesn’t say anything else, thinking too hard about how he’s losing more and more hope that his brother can be saved from all of this with every minute he spends with Sam. 

Sam helps him inside and up the stairs, smiling at the girl sitting behind the desk, her eyes wide as she follows their progress. 

Once inside their room, Dean sits down on his bed, kicks off his shoes, and falls backwards, letting out a quiet, “Oof,” when his head hits the pillow. 

He must drift off, because when he opens his eyes, his head’s pounding and the light coming from the small sitting area makes him wince. Dean groans, sits up, and squints in the direction of his apparently-shirtless brother, curled up on the couch. 

“There’s aspirin on the nightstand along with a glass of water,” Sam murmurs, without looking up from a book. “It’s half an hour from sunrise; go back to sleep.”

Dean rubs his forehead, takes a couple pills and washes them down, grimacing at the chalky aftertaste, the white powder residue on his hands. The headache won’t get much worse, they never do, and he’ll be fine after a couple more hours of sleep, but seeing Sam awake, knowing he can’t have slept, that does nothing for the attitude Dean woke up with. 

“You aren’t sleeping?” he asks, knows he sounds snippy but can’t help it. Seeing the tattoos on Sam’s chest doesn’t make it any better. “Loa keeping you up? Giving you new instructions, new people to kill?”

It takes a minute, but Sam slams his book shut, sets it down on the low table, and stands up, hands on his hips. “There something you wanna say to me, Dean?” he asks, voice low, tone restrained, like he’s been holding back anger for too long and it’s finally shaking its way loose. “Something you’ve been wanting to say for a while, now?”

“Gordon,” Dean says, and his own expression turns angry as Sam’s hardens. “He was a psychopathic bitch, but he was a good hunter, even Dad said so. And you just killed him, like he was nothing. Snapped his damn neck like you’re used to killing people.”

Sam scowls, says, “I had to, Dean. You heard what I said. He would’ve come back with more if I’d let him go, and it’s not like we can just make people forget they found us, not when they’re like Gordon. What the hell else was I supposed to do?”

Dean doesn’t answer that, but asks, “What if it had been me, Sam? Or Dad? Would you have killed us, too?” Sam spins, glares at him, and Dean can almost taste the power rising off of his brother. It should scare him, does, but not as much as it should; it just makes him angry, furious. “If your damned loa asked you to kill us, would you? _Answer me_!” 

“What do you wanna hear, Dean?” Sam all but roars back. “You think I chose this? You think I _asked_ for this? Any of this? Dean, if it could go away, if there was the slightest chance that something, anything, could erase the vévés from my head, do you honestly think I’d still be doing this?” 

Dean looks at his brother, the hurt and anger in Sam’s eyes, and says, “I don’t know what to think.” 

Sam breathes, runs his hands through his hair, and looks away. “All those times I bitched at Dad for the stupidest excuses. All those times I yelled and swore and grumbled about him and his goddamned sense of honour. ‘Doing what needs to be done, Sam,’ you remember? I hated that. And now that’s _my_ line. That’s what I do, I do what needs to be done to keep my people safe, to keep us in line, to keep the loa happy.” 

He stops, shakes his head, and adds, quietly, “And I understand why Dad winced every time he said it. I get why he drank, and why he slept, and why he never wanted to talk about it. Because it sucks. It’s a bad excuse but it’s the only one I have.” 

“Sam,” Dean says, after a moment of letting Sam’s words wash over him and into his mind. “Sam, if the hunters who came after you before, the ones people say you killed. If they’d been me or Dad, would you have killed us?” 

There’s silence in the room for a long, tense moment, but then Sam turns, looks Dean straight in the eye, and says, “Stefanie, no one will blame her death on you, but you killed eight of my people, Dean. Eight, with your own two hands, and you’re still alive. What do _you_ think?” 

“I think this is bullshit, Sam,” Dean says immediately. “You’re not a killer. You’re not some crazy vodou priest. All of this, it’s just fucking with your head. You came down here, probably got hexed or something. Yeah, you know? Lissa’s a witch and Pierre, he’s a magician, isn’t he? I bet that’s why he threw his brother’s dick into your ass, to keep you in line.” 

Sam growls, steps closer to Dean, says, “Shut up, Dean.” 

Dean’s not afraid, not of his little brother. “They needed someone to channel the loa they couldn’t, saw you coming a mile away. Little Sammy, not at all sceptical, because you’d seen this work before, when Dad brought us down here. All they needed to do was work a little magic on you, a little hoodoo, and you’d be all theirs.” 

“Shut _up_, Dean.” 

“No, I won’t. You know why? Because I’m right, Sam. You _know_ I’m right. This whole thing, it’s all been orchestrated to make you feel better, make you feel important. They caught you on a down spot, _weak_, because you left us. If you’d never gone anywhere, this never would’ve happened.” 

Sam’s eyes are so dark, it looks like they’re bottomless black holes. He stops in the middle of the room, opens his mouth, and the words that come out of Sam’s lips, they aren’t Sam’s words. 

“You trying to make him angry, Dean Winchester? You be doing a good job o’ that. I’d be being careful, though. Makes no sense to unleash it all now.”

“Oh, yeah?” Dean asks, cocky, because the loa are only proving his point. “And why’s that, Lakwa? What’s so scary about Sam’s anger, huh? It’s not like it’s gonna do anything.” 

Lakwa tilts his head, smiles. “Boy, what you talking ‘bout? Don’t you know what your brother is?” 

Dean racks his brain, calls up the unfamiliar words, says, “They’ve called him a _poto mitan_. And someone told me to ask you about _zo regleman_, if I ever saw you again.” 

Lawka sits down, crosses his legs, stretching out. “And you ain’t never heard o’ neither of them, that right?” 

“That’s right,” Dean says, wary now, because the smile on Lakwa’s face, it isn’t the smile of someone who’s just been called on his games, on his manipulations. 

“You ever seen a _hounfor_, boy?” Dean nods, and Lakwa’s next question makes him think. “You ever notice a post in the middle?” 

Dean leans back against the wall, finally says, “Don’t know. What’s that got to do with anything?” 

Lawka laughs again, the sound bouncing off the room’s walls. “The post, it’s the _poto mitan_. It’s a, a conduit, you’d call it, brings us from our plane to yours, gives us time to find a horse. It’s sacred,” he says. “The first thing any _houngon_ or _mambo_ learns, it’s to be protectin’ the _poto mitan_. In kind, the _poto mitan_ be protecting them by bringing the riders down.”

It makes sense, in a twisted way. What Pierre told him before, about Sam having vévés drawn in his head, why they call Sam a bridge, why they’re so protective of Sam, that all fits. But that doesn’t explain Sam’s need, desire, to protect these people, to defend them at the cost of hunters’ lives. 

“Now, the _zo regleman_,” Lakwa says, stuffing his hands into Sam’s jeans pockets, leaning back and looking at the ceiling. “You listen carefully to me, boy. _Zo regleman_ is bone law. Law of the loa, law of the rites and rituals, law of vodou. Law of the dead and law of the living. It orders everything our people do, top to bottom, _everything_. And because your brother be the _poto mitan_, he be the final word. He be the law, and the law say he gotta protect his people. The law say he can’t make none of the others do what he ain’t capable of doing hisself.”

Lawka leans forward, fixes his eyes on Dean, and adds, “Your brother, the second he started dreaming of us, the second he was born, vévés written in his head, he ain’t got no choice. He ain’t got a way out. You know him well, Dean. You think he like hearing that?” 

Dean exhales, realises he’s been shaking and forces his muscles to relax, forces himself to calm down. “He would’ve hated it,” he says. 

“Fought us for months,” Lakwa says, nodding. “Nearly killed himself doing it. The people you met, the twins and the girl, they brung him down here. Brung him down to the woman you be meeting, the one he called _maman_. He spent time here, with his people, and they helped. He still bitter, but he be hiding it better now. First hunter he killed, he cried for days, but he ain’t looked back since. Me and Ati, we ain’t letting him.” 

“So you don’t give Sam a choice about whether or not he has to carry you around,” Dean says after a minute. “He goes crazy and dopes up when he’s by himself, and you take over from him whenever you want. But if there’s someone to kill, if there’s any danger, you let him do it. Make _him_ do it, do all of your dirty work.” 

Lakwa’s eyes flash and he pins them on Dean, dark and angry, so far from the laughing, happy loa Dean’s come to expect. “You think that’s our choice, boy? You think, someone like your brother, someone we’d protect, no matter what it be costing us, would stand for that?”

Dean stares at Lakwa as the sun rises through the window, sets his head back to throbbing. “He won’t let you do it for him,” Dean whispers, reaches out and grabs the edge of a chair before his knees give out. He sits, sinking down slowly, feeling nausea rise up his esophagus, though whether that’s the alcohol or the sudden realisation of what Lakwa means, Dean doesn’t know. “He won’t let you do it,” he says again. 

“We be trying,” Lakwa says, shifting moods back to upset, back to gentle soothing. “He say if his hands gonna kill someone, his mind gonna do it, too, no one else’s. Me and Ati, we tried telling him, but he ain’t havin’ none of it.” Lakwa sighs, holds out his hands as if to say, ‘_What else can we do_?’

“I wanna talk to him,” Dean says, abrupt, once he’s swallowed down bile. 

Lakwa studies him, finally nods, but says, “Don’t go making him angry. He’ll need that later, when he deals with the Petro. A’right?” 

Dean nods, and watches as his brother’s eyelids close. 

When they open again, scant seconds later, it’s Sam looking out of expressionless green eyes, it’s Sam who tenses and shifts back in his chair, it’s Sam who looks as if he might be expecting Dean to attack him. 

Dean swallows, says, “I’m sorry.” Sam doesn’t say anything, so Dean goes on. “I wasn’t being fair. But Sam, we’re hunters. Our friends are hunters. We’ve always gone after vodouisantes; hell, some of the others specialise in this. What do you expect me to think?” 

“I expect you to think that maybe this is as hard for me as it is for you,” Sam says after a minute, voice quiet, restrained. “It’s been two years, and it hasn’t gotten any easier. I’ve had to kill three hunters here in Louisiana, one up in Chicago, and now Gordon in San Francisco. I know just as well as you do that our world’s small, that someone’s bound to put things together soon, and I know that those hunters, they were good people, they were doing good things. Until they came here and started hunting _my_ people.” 

Dean blinks, not having expected that, and Sam sees it, gives him a bitter smile. 

“I never wanted to get involved with a new family,” Sam says, “not when ours was trouble enough. I sure as hell didn’t want to end up some sort of, of messiah or prodigy or whatever I am. But I did get involved, and I did end up this way. I don’t like it, but I’ve come to accept it.”

“I don’t know if I can,” Dean says, honest the way only the night makes him honest, honest the way he is when the dark outside is enough to hide in. “Dad sent me back to get you out of this. He wanted me to keep you safe, protect you. But I’m not going to be able to convince you to leave the vodou alone, am I?” 

Sam shakes his head, though there’s a shell-shocked expression on his face now, one that came up when Dean mentioned John. Still, he blinks it off, something Dean remembers Sam doing before he left for Stanford, the way Sam could compartmentalise better than anyone Dean had ever met before, shut himself off, down, and use what was left. 

“You don’t have to stay if you don’t want to.” Dean opens his mouth to protest, but Sam keeps going, speaking over whatever Dean was going to say. “I want you to. There’s always the possibility Marinette could try getting into you again, no matter what charms I give you. I’ll be able to tell if she does.”

Dean’s eyes narrow as he asks, “Is that the only reason?” 

Sam holds Dean’s gaze for a moment before he looks away, before the mask drops and Dean sees what Sam’s been hiding, the desperate need for reassurance, for security, the loneliness and depression and absolute anguish at being apart from his friends and lovers. Seeing it, Dean could kick himself for going off on Sam like he had, for thinking that Sam was all right with everything that had been happening, because Dean knows masks, knows how to look for them, how to crack them, and he didn’t even realise Sam was wearing one. 

“What else, Sam?” Dean asks, and the room turns silent, no noise, nothing, except for the sounds filtering in through the open window, up from downstairs, in from the hallway, as the rest of the house starts to wake up. “Sam?”

“You’re my brother, Dean,” Sam replies, as if the words had been reeled out of him, talisman and curse both. Sam swallows, then shakes his head, stands up, and leaves the room, mentioning something about the bathroom, something about cleaning up for breakfast. 

Dean’s left sitting alone in the room, watching as rays of sunlight grow and spread over both beds, as the morning starts to heat up, turn liquid around him, wet and clinging to his skin. He doesn’t move, waiting for Sam, but he falls asleep, still nursing a hangover and drained from the argument he’s just had with Sam, like the southern heat’s grown arms and curled around him, warm and comforting.


	5. Chapter 5

In the grand tradition of Winchesters, they don’t talk about the argument. Dean ignores the way Sam hesitates before asking if Dean wants to go along with him to see a friend, and Dean ignores the way his cock twitches when Sam’s vowels lengthen and his consonants ease, like his language has been melted by the same heat that has Dean sweating through the lightest t-shirt he owns in the first three minutes after his shower. 

Sam’s friend lives over in Assumption Parish, and they drive with the windows down after eating breakfast. Dean’s head still aches, so there’s no music, but they cross the Mississippi and take a side road over to Belle Rose, the noise outside enough to distract them, provide some sort of background for the less-than-comfortable silence inside. 

This time, instead of ordering Dean to stay in the car, Sam asks if Dean would like to go inside. Dean debates, but shrugs and goes along with his brother once the car’s parked, standing behind Sam when Sam knocks on an apartment door in what sounds like a pattern. 

Dean’s ready to ask what the pattern means, if it actually is one, but as soon as Sam knocks for the last time, there’s a shriek inside, and the sound of someone running to the door. 

“Fucking unlock, you bitch!” the female voice inside screams as, Dean thinks, she fumbles with the lock, and when the door finally swings open, there’s not any delay before Sam’s got his arms full of girl, is laughing and swinging her around. 

“Ah, _tifi_, I’d like to breathe sometime this century,” Sam finally says, and the girl extricates herself from Sam. She opens her mouth to say something, but Sam puts a finger over her lips, and when she scowls, puts her hands on her hips, he says, “I’d like you to meet someone.” 

She peers around Sam and her eyes widen when she sees Dean, edging backwards just the slightest bit. Dean can’t help raising an eyebrow, seeing her; she’s tiny, not an inch over five foot, but she has to be their age, has tanned skin and blonde hair, would look like a typical California girl if it wasn’t for the long, jagged scar that starts near one eye and goes down the length of her face, down one side of her neck and dips under the collar of her t-shirt. 

“Who the fuck is this?” she asks, suspicious. 

Dean snorts, says in response, “Who the fuck am I? Who the fuck are _you_?” and isn’t at all surprised when she grins, showing him her teeth. 

“Oh, I think I like him,” she says to Sam, though Dean notices that she doesn’t move from where she’s standing, protected by Sam, one step away from being able to slam the door in his face. 

“_Tifi_, this is Dean.” 

She swings her eyes at Sam, wide and surprised, then turns back to Dean, studying him, letting her eyes linger on his amulet and charm before working their way down, then up again. “You’re Dean?” she asks, as if she can’t believe it.

“Should I be worried about how you’re saying that?” Dean asks, surprising a laugh out of her. “What kind of stories has Sam been telling about me?” 

“Only the very interesting kind,” she says. “I’m Kate. Before you ask, Sam saved me from a handful of fucking rabid zombies a year ago. It was close.” Kate turns, disappears back inside the house, and from around a corner, calls out, “Are you coming or not, you lazy fucks?”

Sam grins, and is about to step inside when Dean puts a hand out, grabs his brother’s arm. 

“Zombies?” he asks, and sees something in Sam’s eyes shutter. 

“You aren’t the first person to get caught in Marinette’s traps,” he murmurs, before shrugging off Dean’s hold, going inside. 

Dean waits outside for a minute, tries piecing that together with what he’s heard Sam say, talking to other people, because he’s getting the feeling that something’s going on, something with this one loa in particular, and if the way his stomach’s churning, it’ll have something to do with the gatherings Sam’s planning, with the way Lissa seemed so worried about Sam yesterday. 

Running a hand through his hair, down to his neck, Dean walks inside, turns and shuts, locks the door, eyes casting up and down the street first. He doesn’t see anyone, but the back of his neck is prickling like someone’s watching. Dean doesn’t like that feeling one little bit. 

Kate’s got her head stuck in the freezer, rummaging for something, and by the time Dean’s sitting at the table just outside of the tiny kitchen, next to Sam, she’s pulling out a carton of rainbow sherbet in something that looks like a dance of triumph. Dean frowns, because Sam hates sherbet, but when he looks at his brother, Sam’s eyes are wide and fixated on the carton. 

“Did you know I was coming?” he drawls, tapping the table, and turns an innocent smile on Kate when she looks out at them. 

“Fuck, no,” she immediately replies. “When’s the last time you were here, Sam, seven months ago? Eight? No, I always have a carton of the fucking stuff, usually end up eating it all myself, then I have to go out and fucking buy more, you fucker. You could visit more, you know?” 

She’s smiling, but even Dean can see through it, under it. 

“I’m sorry,” Sam says, quietly. “Things have been hectic. This was the first chance I had to come back, and I didn’t really have a choice.” 

Kate dishes up sherbet in two chipped bowls before she looks up at Dean and asks, “You want some?” 

Dean nods, Kate rolls her eyes, and it’s quiet while she pulls out a third bowl, pristine, looks hardly used, fills it with sherbet. All three get thumped on the table and Kate goes back for spoons before she sits down across from the brothers. 

“Now, you said you didn’t have a choice about leaving?” she asks, once Sam’s got a mouthful of sherbet. “That sounds bad. What the fuck happened?” 

Sam shakes his head, says, “Time to move on,” though Dean sees Kate isn’t buying it, doesn’t buy it himself, not after their argument that morning. Sam sighs when they both do nothing more than look at him, and he says, “Shit hit the fan. I was told to get out of town before the house collapsed.” 

“You going back?” Kate asks, voice surprisingly even, dispassionate. Her eyes, though, are gleaming in a mix of sorrow and joy. “Them fuckers won’t know what to do without you, Sam.” 

Sam’s lips quirk, but he says, “They’ll be fine. They’ll have to be fine. I’m not going back for a while, if ever. It’s not safe.” 

Kate drops her spoon, pushes her bowl across the table, then crawls under it, popping up between Sam’s knees, wiggling her way up onto his lap, giving him a hug. “You stupid, crazy, fucker,” she mutters, burying her face in his neck. “I bet you haven’t even fucking thrown things, have you? Trying to be all strong, manly, what-the-fuck-ever you think you should be doing.” 

She sits up, points at Dean, and says, “You better take good fucking care of him, or I’ll fucking hurt you, you understand me?” 

Dean resists the urge to salute, hearing the tone she’s using, and just nods, leans back in his chair and licks one side of his spoon before saying, “Oh, believe me, I’m trying.” 

Kate gives him a narrow-eyed look, before nodding. “Yeah, I bet.” She swings her focus back to Sam, and pokes him with every word she says. “And I bet you aren’t fucking having it, are you? Stupid fucker,” and hugs him so tight it looks to Dean like Sam can’t breathe. 

She finally lets go and they keep eating their sherbet while Kate goes on a verbal rampage about everything she’s done since the last time she talked to Sam, every other word a swear word. 

Dean’s been around a lot of hunters, but most of them don’t swear as much in an hour as this girl does in a breath, and he’s getting the impression that he’d really like to get to know her better under different circumstances. She doesn’t fit the image of the people down here, with her sharp angles and energy, mood swings and coarseness, and nothing in this apartment says vodou or hoodoo to Dean, nothing except Kate’s scar. 

\--

It’s not until they’re leaving, three hours of eating, drinking, and gossiping later, that Sam finally says, gently, “There’s going to be a gathering tonight and tomorrow night, maybe the night afterwards as well.” 

Dean’s halfway out the door but he turns around in time to see Kate’s face drain of colour, see her cling to Sam as if her legs are about to give out. 

“Sam,” she whispers, “please. _Poto mitan_, please.” 

Sam draws her in to his arms; she’s so tiny it’s like Dean can’t even see her. Sam’s crooning words into her ear, rubbing circles on her back, and it’s only when Dean steps back inside the apartment that he hears some of the words Sam’s saying, things like, ‘won’t make you’ and ‘just wanted you to know,’ ‘be safe’ and ‘block them out.’ 

It only takes a couple minutes before Kate’s wiping her cheeks and giving them both a saucy grin that barely wobbles. “You go on, then,” she says, tugging Sam down and planting one on his lips. “Kick some ass for me, would ya?” She turns to Dean, then, tugs him down and gives him a kiss as well, sliding her tongue over his upper lip, sharp teeth nipping at the bottom. “Keep the fucker safe, Dean,” she whispers. 

Dean can only nod. 

\--

“She’s empathic,” Sam says once they’re driving back towards Ascension Parish, answering the question before Dean can ask. “That’s why Marinette went after her. I wouldn’t’ve told her, but she’d pick it up anyway, this many horses and riders in the same place. This way she at least has time to prepare.” 

“When you say Marinette went after her,” Dean says, trailing off, inviting an explanation. 

Sam sighs, shifts in the seat, studies his hands. “Kate’s from Pittsburgh,” he finally says. “She came down to Tulane on a scholarship and her empathy broke over Mardi Gras. She ended up driving as far away from the city as she could get, her car broke down, and next thing she knew, she was lying on her back next to Spanish Lake while a pack of zombies tried to eat her.”

Dean blinks, says, “They kidnapped her? What, empath’s blood is good zombie food?”

“Marinette rode her,” Sam says dryly, not looking at his brother. “When Kate got to Spanish Lake, Marinette called up some zombies and was going to let them eat Kate to get enough strength to turn revenant. Kate was useful, nothing more.”

Dean says, “Huh,” and takes a minute to think about that, ignoring the way he gets chills at the thought of the same loa inside of him, doing whatever she wants. He finally nods, and asks, “So, what? You came in, knight in shining armour?” 

Sam snorts, slouches down a little, replies, “Not exactly,” and doesn’t go on. 

Dean waits a little, waits to see if Sam’s going to expand, but when his little brother doesn’t, Dean says, “Oh, come on. You can’t just say something like that and not explain. What’d you do?” 

Sam shakes his head but Dean pushes a little more, and finally Sam says, “You wanna know what I did, Dean? Fine, I’ll tell you. First I got rid of the zombies, banished them all back into the lake to rot, and when they were gone, I got Marinette out of Kate’s body. But since it was just me and I was pretty damn new at all of this, there was only one way I knew how to do that. So yeah, she healed up from the zombies, but now she’s got a scar that starts at her eyebrow and goes down to her hipbone, one that won’t ever heal and will remind her every time she fucking _breathes_ of what happened.”

Sam stops for breath, turns slightly to look out the window, pain and worry lines crinkling the corners of his eyes. 

Dean says, “She didn’t seem like she minded,” quietly, once he gets that Sam made the scar, probably knows enough now that if the same thing happened, he wouldn’t have to, regrets needing to in the first place. “Personally, I think she’s probably happy to have survived.”

“Yeah, try telling that to her parents, or to the boyfriend that broke up with her, or anyone who looks at her when she’s walking down the street,” Sam says, enough bitterness flooding out of his mouth that Dean can almost taste it hovering in the air, sharp and acrid. There’s silence for a moment while Dean searches for something to say, but then Sam says, “Sorry. I shouldn’t take it out on you.” 

“I’m tough,” Dean says, an instant reply. “I can take it.” 

He looks over and sees one corner of Sam’s lips quirk for a split-second before the barest hint of a smile disappears back into Sam’s silent, expressionless face. Dean feels sick, seeing it.

\--

Sam gives Dean a quick lesson in hoodoo to pass the afternoon away, teaching Dean how to identify workings, how to sidestep certain spells, how to counteract others. It’s a crash-course in folk magic, Dean knows that three hours won’t make him an expert, but the things he’s being taught, the things Sam’s telling him, they’re more than he or John ever figured out. Hell, Dean’s pretty sure it’s more than most hunters combined have put together. Not that hoodoo’s hard or anything, the beauty of the magic is its simplicity, but the way Sam’s telling him things, they make sense, fit snug next to one another. 

Dean might not appreciate lectures, but not only is this fascinating, it seems to be helping Sam as well. Sam’s looking at his watch every so often, occasionally drops off in the middle of a sentence and looks outside, like he’s expecting to hear or see something in the garden, something coming out of the bayou. Nothing does, but Sam’s distracted unless he’s explaining the finer points of foot-track magic or how to make out a five-spot in the middle of the woods or what the significance of colours are when it comes to the candles lots of these places seem to have burning in windows.

At the exact moment the sun sets, Sam stands up, stretches, and while Dean’s busy trying not to look at his brothers hipbones or the very bottom curls of Sam’s tattoos, Sam says, “I should get going.” 

“Sam,” Dean says, instant reaction, though he stops when Sam looks at him, eyes bottomless, shoulders heavy. 

“They won’t like a stranger, especially one who was tainted by Marinette, and they _will_ be able to tell,” Sam says. “I can only do so much to convince them to let you stay, and not one of them will be happy about it.”

Dean stands up, asks, “Are you saying that if I go, they might try to kill me?”

Sam turns away, says, “There’s only so much that _zo regleman_ lets me get away with in circumstances like this. I’ve cultivated friends and allies for times like this, but they aren’t bound by our agreements, not when it comes to someone who isn’t initiated.” 

“I’m going,” Dean says, like its final. The way Sam doesn’t argue, maybe it is.

As they’re getting into the Impala, Sam carrying a bag full of things Dean hasn’t seen, Sam pauses, looks toward the bayou. He shudders and gets into the car.

\--

They’re nearly to the street Lissa lives down when Sam finally speaks again. 

“On the left, up ahead, there’s a road,” he says. 

Dean raises an eyebrow, is about to make some smart-ass remark about that being nice and all, but he doesn’t, not when he remembers what they’re coming here to do, what might happen. Instead, when the road appears on the left, barely visible in the twilight, Dean puts on his blinker and turns. 

As the Impala goes over the bumps and dips into the pot-holes, Sam starts speaking again. “Don’t say anything if you can help it,” he says. “Remember that anyone you talk to could be ridden at any time. These are the Rada, they’ll be nicer but they’re not all sugar and spice. Try not to offend any of them, and try not to lie outright. Once the gathering starts, not many people will talk. Keep an eye on the ones that do. Don’t mention Marinette, or hunting, or that you’re my brother, whatever you do.”

Dean listens to the instructions, makes notes but doesn’t promise to follow them, because he won’t, not if Sam’s in trouble. He just nods, makes agreeable noises, and when Sam figures out what Dean’s doing, he lets it go and points out a place for Dean to park. 

After they’re out of the Impala, Dean checks the knives and guns he’s carrying, makes sure they’re ready, that he’s ready, for anything that might happen. He’s tense, especially because they’re in the trees, near Spanish Lake and in the middle of the swamplands, and it’s like he doesn’t have enough to worry about with the vodouisantes, he’s got to be thinking about snakes and gators and the goddamned mosquitoes everywhere, too. 

Sam rolls his eyes as Dean starts swatting around his head, walks over and whispers something, draws a pattern on Dean’s forehead. The smell of menthol floods Dean’s nose and he sneezes once, twice, three times. The mosquitoes buzz away, leaving him alone, and Dean feels cooler, like there’s suddenly a breeze catching on his skin. 

“Hoodoo?” Dean asks, the trees around them catching the sound of his speech, the heat in the air melting it and making it disappear. 

“Vodou,” Sam says, and takes off down a pathway Dean hadn’t noticed before, walking with purpose and like he’s been here before. 

Dean hurries up, follows Sam, and keeps an eye on everything around them. 

They walk, walk more, then walk some more, and just when Dean thinks his feet are about ready to fall off his body, just when he thinks that he’s going to sweat to death out here, he stops, looking in at a clearing right next to the lake. Sam’s standing to one side, and Dean’s about ready to thank his brother for letting him get his bearings when he sees Sam looking around, like he’s judging the people here, what kind of reception they’ll have. 

One person comes up to them right away, takes hold of Sam’s hands and kisses Sam on the knuckles. It’s a man, stout, with a big belly and a wide grin, teeth shining in the darkness.

“_Poto mitan_,” he murmurs, before dropping Sam’s hands and accepting a kiss on the forehead from Sam’s lips. “You sent out a fast _houtongi_. A few of the others won’t be able to make it tonight.” There’s a pause as Sam nods, amusement dancing in his eyes, then the man says, “Heya, no one can accuse you of manipulating things. We’ve been needing a gathering for a week now, were waiting for you.”

That makes Sam laugh, and Dean’s looking around as more people notice them, keeping track of who looks pleased to see Sam and who doesn’t. 

“And who is this?” the man in front of Sam asks, looking at Dean. 

“A friend,” Sam says.

The man’s eyes rest on Dean’s charm, Dean’s amulet. He raises an eyebrow, and Sam raises one back, saying nothing more, and eventually the man tilts his head slightly, backs down from the challenge. 

“A pleasure to have you with us tonight,” the man says. 

Dean smiles back and keeps his mouth shut, just like Sam told him to. That makes the man tilt his head, look a little closer. “He knows?” the man says, but Dean knows, despite the eyes pressing into his, it’s not directed at him. 

“Some,” Sam says. “Not much. Enough to survive, unless some of the _vwasinaj_ decide to act up.” 

The man nods once, shallow, and steps to the side, murmuring, “And here comes one now.” 

Dean looks behind, sees another man approaching Sam with haughty steps and an up-tilted chin, challenge in every step, every movement. Dean doesn’t like him, just by looking at him, the way his clothes seem to hang, drape, off of his body, the way one third of the people here are watching him, eyes flicking between him and Sam to see what’s going to happen. 

The second man steps up to Sam, takes his hands and bows over them, but there’s no kiss, no smile. Sam places one hand on the man’s head but doesn’t kiss his forehead. Dean thinks it looks ritualistic, formulaic, like something they both have to do but would rather not. 

“_Poto mitan_,” the man drawls, loose and lazy. “So kind of you to come down. We were wondering if you would drop by after the tumult.” 

“I would have been here sooner, but there were things that needed doing,” Sam replies, as if the man hasn’t just insulted him. “Hunters that needed killing,” he adds. 

Although Dean doesn’t like it, he recognises that it’s something Sam needed to say, something that makes a few of the previously-tense vodouisantes relax, like it answers the one question that was the only thing holding them back from rejoicing at Sam’s appearance. 

The man in front of Sam gives Sam a tight smile, and then looks over at Dean. He doesn’t say anything to Dean or about Dean, but his eyes flash, meeting Dean’s, and his lip curls when he sees the charm. 

“We’re all here,” the man finally says, turning, stepping to Sam’s left hand side as the other, smiling man from before steps to Sam’s right. “Shall we begin?” 

Dean’s left hovering behind them, watching Sam’s back as everyone else, all the practitioners, form a loose circle. 

“Thank you for coming,” Sam says, first in English, then in French, then in Creole, and everything he says after that is in Creole, foreign to Dean’s ears. 

\--

They stand there and talk for what seems like hours, the swamp dark around them. Dean listens to the rise and fall of conversation, the ebb and flow of peace and hostility, watches as people argue with Sam, question Sam, agree with Sam. There’s a definite split between two groups, one that seems, for the most part, pretty peaceful, pretty calm, and one that doesn’t like his brother and probably never will. 

No one seems to care that he’s there, listening, and he doesn’t think anyone remembers his presence when one of the men in the circle falls to his knees, ridden by one of the loa. A few others wear a bridle, most standing, don’t look any different except for the way they step forward, like only those with loa inside can move any closer to the middle. There are six in the middle when Sam finally joins them, but when Sam speaks to the loa-ridden he doesn’t sound any different, still sounds like Sam. 

The seven in the middle, now, they talk and sob and give orders, making sure everyone else is listening, and though a few of them look upset, clench their jaws and nod reluctantly, everyone agrees before the loa give the horses back their own minds. 

Sam stays in the middle, says something low and sharp in Creole. No one looks happy at what he says, but Sam says it again, sharper, pressing his point. Dean thinks it’s not good, the way Sam doesn’t seem to care what they all think, but he doesn’t want to remind anyone he’s here watching. 

The second man who’d greeted Sam moves, argues, and so does the first man, who seems like he’s moving against his wishes, like he wouldn’t disagree but has to for some reason. 

Sam growls, gives his order again, and when no one changes the position they’re standing in, no one moves, he gives them a cold, calculating smile and lifts his hands, starts singing something discordant, off-key. 

One or two drop to their knees as soon as he starts singing, a few others look shocked, but Sam keeps going. Even though it’s dark, Dean can almost see smoke curling around the circle, smoke and the smell of camphor, and the trees start moving, start waving. 

He can’t understand what Sam’s saying, but he recognises words, _poto mitan_ and _zo regleman_, _hountogi_ and _hounfor_, and as the wind grows and whips ‘round the trees, ‘round the circle, more and more drop to their knees. 

Sam screams something, and Dean feels buzzing, feels an ache start to grow in the back of his skull, like something’s trying to burrow through holes into his brain, into his spine and nervous system. He shivers, even though it’s so hot and the sweat’s carving rivers in his back, and he drops to his knees as well when Sam starts looking at the people still standing, forcing his will on them through his gaze. 

One by one, they all drop, some looking at Sam defiantly, even now, most with their head bowed. The wind dies down again, and Dean’s head aches fiercely, drilling pressure, even as Sam’s talking. 

He doesn’t notice as people start leaving in ones and twos, straggling into the woods, into the darkness; he’s still on his knees, trying to keep his hands at his sides and look out for his brother, not show how weak he is, how much pain he’s in. 

The first man who greeted Sam runs a hand over Dean’s head as he leaves, and Dean sways, feeling his touch like balm to the headache, soothing and healing. 

Dean blinks, and when he opens his eyes, he’s lying flat on his back, staring up at the sky.

“Did you get the number of that bus?” he asks, surprised and yet not to hear his voice rasping, to have to blink to clear his eyes and get his vision to steady, settle. 

“Loko doesn’t like being called fat,” Sam says, sitting next to Dean, looking out at the lake. “Especially when he’s only trying to help. But he says you’re welcome.” 

Dean sits up, groans and rubs his head, and asks, “No, seriously. What the fuck was that?” 

Sam smiles, slow and slight, just for a split-second, then shakes his head. “That was Loko, trying to help you with your headache. And your headache, that was from Marinette. Erzulie Freda was riding one of the others; Marinette wants to kill everyone ‘Zulie can ride. She was going to use you to kill one of the horses.”

Dean freezes, finally clears his throat with a choking little laugh and says, “Well, fuck. How many horses are there?” 

“That we know of? Only a handful. Not many people are willing to let ‘Zulie Freda ride them. It requires too much peace, too much good-will,” Sam says. He pauses, is obviously holding something back, and when Dean presses, Sam says, “Erzulie has three faces. Freda’s the Rada, but there’s another, Erzulie Dantor, the Petro face. That’s who Marinette’s upset with, that’s who she _really_ wants, and as far as we know, there’s only one person she rides.” 

Dean thinks, lets his mind race back over everything he’s learned in the past few days, the past week and a half, and eventually says, “Danny-girl, right? That’s you.” He feels hollow, numb, knowing that the loa who possessed him wants to kill Sam just as much as other hunters would if they knew, maybe even more so. 

“Come on,” Sam says after a minute, standing up and offering Dean a hand. “Let’s get out of here and go get shit-faced. Tomorrow night will be worse.”

Dean looks up, can read absolutely nothing in Sam’s expression, and takes his brother’s hand, lets Sam pull him up. “You are going to tell me what happened, right?” 

Sam tilts his head, says, “What do you mean, tell you,” before he trails off, rolls his eyes. “The Creole, right? Damn it. I was hoping you’d be able to answer some questions. Well. We’ll think of something before tomorrow night.” 

Sam starts walking out of the clearing, back to the Impala, and Dean’s left scrambling to follow, asking, “So is that a yes?”

\--

They’re at a bar built right on the bayou, beers cold and sweating in their hands. Half the people left the instant they walked in, the other half nodded at Sam or looked away, and Dean wonders just how far his brother’s influence down here spreads. 

He asks, once they’re sitting in the back, after the waitress has brought them a bowl of peanuts and quietly whispered something about having them give her the high sign if they need her. “The people here, they’re spooked,” Dean says, glancing around, seeing a few people still watching them, still watching Sam. 

“People down here have long memories,” Sam says, after sipping at his own beer. “And they aren’t spooked. They’re careful.” He sighs, plays with the bottle, and says, “People in the south, they don’t forget. It’s in the air or something, maybe the shrimp, I never figured it out, but they believe. They’ve seen it work or they know someone else who has, so when they see me come in with tattoos halfway down my arms and you with that charm, they’re cautious. Nothing’s wrong with a little caution.” 

Sam’s eyes flash as he’s saying it, like one of the loa are moving in the back, and Dean gets chills, swallows down his beer like water. Nothing’s wrong with being cautious, hell, John taught them that when they were kids, but Dean thinks there’s something different going on here, something more than caution, more than belief, closer to fear. Still, with that look in Sam’s eyes, Dean’s not going to push. 

“What happened out there tonight?” Dean asks instead. “And what’ll be different tomorrow night?” 

Sam smiles, sharp and quick, and ducks his head. “What happened tonight was the Rada reminding everyone of their place,” he says, the tone matching the smile. “The Rada told everyone to behave and to trust me, that I know what I’m doing. A few of them had to be convinced. That wasn’t a fight, though, that was just pressure. Tomorrow night, with the Petro, that’ll be a fight.” 

The smile disappears, and Sam gives Dean a look, one that seems serious, but Dean sees worry behind it, worry and a certain sense of exhilaration. 

“Tomorrow night, they won’t accept you being there without a fight,” Sam says. “I don’t know what I’ll have to do to get them to let you stay, but I’ll do what I have to. Will you?” 

Dean leans back at the question, kicks his chair back and balances on two legs, props one foot up on a leg of the table between them. The table shakes and one of the peanuts falls out of the bowl in the middle, rolls across the surface and stops near the edge, hovers there. 

Sam’s been saying it a lot lately, that he’ll do what he has to, and Dean’s starting to worry about that. It’s one thing to hear John say it, know why, but to hear Sam say the same thing, in the same tone, so serious, so concerned, so driven, it doesn’t seem like Sam, doesn’t seem right. 

“Don’t you ever do something because you want to?” Dean asks, trying to sound like it’s a random question, like it doesn’t mean anything. Sam, though, looks at him like he knows, like he understands. “Oh, come on, Sam. Just doing things because you have to? That’s no life, even Dad knows that.” 

“I do what I have to first,” Sam says, eyes pinned on Dean’s. “If I have time afterwards, then I do what I want.”

Dean snorts, takes a swallow of his beer, and gestures to the waitress. When she comes over, he leans over, says, “We’ll need a couple more beers, and why don’t you bring over a couple glasses and a bottle of whisky, when you can, no rush.” 

She seems taken aback by the addendum, says, “Right away,” and walks off, looking over her shoulder once at Dean, as if she still can’t believe what he said. 

Sam’s studying him when Dean turns back to face his little brother. Dean asks what Sam’s thinking about, and Sam just shakes his head. 

\--

They stagger into the room, both of them drunk off their asses, and Dean sits on the bed with a happy little sigh, puts his hands over his arms and stretches, t-shirt riding up, baring his stomach to air that’s warm and thick with the smell of jasmine. Sam trips over his feet and ends up face first on the couch, one leg falling off, the other under his body at an awkward angle. Dean starts laughing, can’t help it, and Sam laughs as well, deep belly rumbles that make Dean’s skin feel too tight, stretched over a body, bones and muscles, that are suddenly too big. 

“Tomorrow night,” Dean says. 

Sam cuts him off, says something into the couch cushion, finally turns his head, spits out his hair, and repeats himself without Dean ever having to ask. “Tonight, Dean. ‘S’tonight. What about it?” 

“To_night_, then,” Dean says, emphasising the word for Sam’s sake, “are we going to die?” 

Sam rolls, falls off the couch, and lands on the floor with a muttered curse in something that isn’t English. He twists while Dean’s watching, ends up with his hands under his head, t-shirt stretched tight over his shoulders, expanse of golden-tanned skin between the bottom of the shirt and the waistband of Sam’s jeans, tattoos curling and swooping out over lines of muscle. 

“Not if I have anything to say about it,” Sam says. “Bondye hear me, those damned loa _owe_ me.” 

“Amen,” Dean mutters, and while he’s looking at Sam’s stomach, the tendons in Sam’s arms, he falls asleep.


	6. Chapter 6

Sam’s sleeping when Dean wakes up, late morning sunrays batting at his eyes, heating up his face to burning. He wrinkles his nose, would rather be going back to sleep, but his stomach’s growling and he needs to piss, so Dean gets up, steps over Sam, still lying on the floor, and makes his way to the bathroom. 

After that, Dean goes downstairs, asks the girl at the desk, one he’s never seen before, if there’s any chance of them getting some food. She’s halfway to saying no when someone else comes out. It’s the girl that checked them in, gave him a funny look before, but she smiles and says, “He’s in room five,” to the other girl and it’s like a switch. “We’ll send some food up,” she says to Dean, and Dean nods and smiles, trying not to worry about his food being hexed or something from the way they’re both looking at him. 

As he’s climbing back up the steps, feeling two pairs of eyes on him, he hears them whispering, something about Sam, something about a new _masisi_, and Dean frowns. 

He gets back to the room and steps inside, closes the door and leans on it, studying his brother. Sam must’ve woken up at some point during the night, while Dean was sleeping, because his shirt’s in a ball under Sam’s head and the top button of his jeans is undone, Sam stretched out and taking up space in a way he doesn’t when he’s awake. Dean gets closer, lets his eyes follow the pattern of the tattoos until Dean’s dizzy and seeing things, except, as he rubs his eyes, bends down, he’s not. White powder on Sam’s lips, and when Sam opens his mouth to breathe, Dean sees flecks on Sam’s tongue. 

“The fuck’s that?” he asks, and Sam jerks away, groans and flings one hand over his eyes. “Sam, what did you get into when I was sleeping?” Sam murmurs something unintelligible, tries to curl in on himself and go back to sleep, but Dean won’t let him. “Come on, man, answer me.” 

“Ro,” Sam mutters, moving his hand and looking at Dean through bleary, narrowed eyes. “Woke up and they were just.” He stops, waves his hand, and blinks, slow and long. “Gone. Needed something. Had to have something, ‘nd you were sleeping.” 

Dean’s about ready to push the issue, but there’s a knock on the door. Sam groans, crawls onto the sofa and lets his feet dangle over one edge as the girls carry in two trays overloaded with food. Dean watches them carefully, sees them take in the two beds, one unmade, the other untouched, the two bags, Sam’s shirt on the floor, and Dean’s about ready to tell them they’re brothers, when Sam sits up, looks at them. 

Both girls blush, but the one that was behind the desk can’t meet Sam’s eyes and skitters out of the room the minute she can. The other raises a sardonic eyebrow and says, “Kate called this morning. She said to let her know if you didn’t come back.” 

Sam says something in French that sounds short and to the point, and the girl, the one who checked them in, the one who interrupted the other, laughs as she leaves. 

“Dude,” Dean says, turning to Sam once the door’s clicked closed. “Does _everyone_ down here know you?” 

“This is where I stayed the last couple times I came to visit,” Sam says, voice raspy, caught on the edges of an alcohol- and drug-induced sleep. “That was Miranda. She and Kate are fucking. Were fucking. Have fucked. Whatever. Can I go back to sleep now?” 

\--

The day passes in a blur for Dean, though judging from circles under Sam’s eyes that seem to be getting darker every time Dean looks, Sam wouldn’t say the same. They spend a few hours doing some kind of ritual with a couple drums Sam’s somehow been carrying around, and end up stringing another amulet onto Dean’s necklace. Dean doesn’t understand what it’s for until he sees Sam say something that doesn’t jive with the sounds Dean hears. 

“I told you what it was for,” Sam says after Dean asks. 

“No, you said it was like some kind of fish,” Dean argues back. 

Sam rolls his eyes, says something about a book, and then says, slowly, like he’s explaining this to a five year old, “It helps you understand Creole.” Dean tilts his head, narrows his eyes, because there aren’t magic charms to translate languages mid-air, and Sam sighs, says, “Yes, it’s vodou. Yes, it’s dangerous. No, it won’t work for everyone. No, I’m not telling you how it works because no, it won’t work for everything. Look, keep it on for tonight, and once the gathering’s done, you can take it off, okay?” 

Sam’s jumpy, argumentative, looks like he’s aching for a fight and trying to rein himself in at the same time, and Dean holds up his hands, says, “No argument from me,” watching as Sam takes a deep breath and moves to the window, scratches at his scalp. 

“I’m sorry,” Sam says. “Dealing with a lot of Petro loa makes me itchy. Dealing with a lot of Petro horses makes me itchy. Trust me,” he adds, “when I say that they’re feeling worse.” 

“How do you know?” Dean asks, soft, not challenging, just wanting to know. As much as Sam wants him to stay out of this, as much as he wants to get Sam out of this, Dean can’t deny that it’s fascinating, getting a first-hand look into this culture, this group that he’s been on the periphery of decimating, destroying, for years. Its common knowledge among hunters that the Petro horses, they’re mean, tough, but no one’s ever known before, not like Dean does now, if that’s personality or the loa.

Sam turns back to look at Dean, sunlight framing his head, casting his hair in a glow that echoes and cascades down his body. Dean’s throat feels dry, like his mouth is parched, lips swollen and halfway to splitting. 

“Because Danny and I get along,” Sam finally says. “Because I called the gathering. And because I know what the outcome will be.” 

“What’s that?” Dean asks, can’t _not_ ask. 

The look Sam gives him, the smile, makes Dean’s heart skip a beat. 

“Whatever I want it to be.” 

\--

Sam’s too full of energy to eat, prowling around the room like a caged tiger, and he nearly bites Dean’s head off when Dean tells him to relax. Sam apologises right away, says that he and Danny get along well but her presence in him is usually evened out by Ati and Lakwa, except that neither of them are inside Sam now, not with a Petro gathering later on. 

Dean waves it off, ignores the edge of anxiety he feels low in his gut, and goes downstairs, flirts with the receptionist, Miranda, who smiles back with her teeth and calls back to the kitchen for some dinner. She doesn’t flirt back, though, doesn’t touch him more than absolutely necessary, doesn’t do anything that someone else might misconstrue as interest, and as much as it pisses Dean off, it intrigues him, too, because whether she’s a lesbian or not, he knows he’s pretty.

He asks her about it, and she comes back with a stupid reply that doesn’t answer a thing, though her eyes flick to the ceiling, as if she’s looking at or for Sam, and that’s more of an answer than her words. Whatever she was talking about with the other girl, whatever she thinks, Dean’s clueless and he’d really like someone to share the secret with him. Miranda’s not about to, just tells him to have Sam call Kate when it’s all done and to enjoy the shrimp. 

“Shrimp. Right,” Dean says, and takes a tray of food back up to the room. Sam’s still prowling and pacing, face stuck in one expression, carved out of marble, and he wrinkles his nose when he sees Dean come in with food. 

Dean blinks, looks at Sam, then down at his dinner, and says, “I’ll be in the hallway if you need me.” 

What makes this whole thing even stranger is that no one who walks past him, guest or employee, asks him why he’s eating in the hallway and not in his room. 

\--

The swamp’s strangely silent when Dean parks the Impala and gets out, let his shoulders pop as he reaches to check the gun shoved in the back of his jeans. 

“Leave it,” Sam says. 

Dean looks over at his brother, all the hair on his arms standing on end at the tone of Sam’s voice. Far from the near-aggressive manner Sam had in the room, he’s standing stock still, looking into the trees, down the path, as if he can see what’s waiting for them, as if he knows what’s going to happen. 

“Sam, I,” Dean says, before Sam turns and looks at him. “Sam, come _on_,” he argues. “You can’t expect me to go in there without weapons, not when I don’t know what the hell’s going on.” 

“_Leave them_,” Sam says, eyes narrowing, loa swirling in the back of furious pupils. 

The look by itself might have been enough to convince Dean, but the look _and_ tone combined have him taking the gun out and leaving it in the Impala, reaching down and taking the back-up out of his boot, throwing it next to the other. He stands up straight, looks over at his brother, and raises an eyebrow when he sees Sam taking his shirt off. “This something I haven’t heard about? Some kind of ritual thing?” 

Sam gives Dean another look, says, “It’ll save time later.” Dean raises an eyebrow, and Sam says, “The tattoos. I have a feeling I’ll need to remind them all who I am. The tattoos will help.”

Dean’s suddenly not feeling so good about this whole thing, not that he ever felt anything less than apprehensive before. 

He follows Sam down the winding path and when it breaks out into the clearing, he swallows. There are only twenty people there, not the forty or fifty there were last night, but these twenty look angry, look ready for a fight. 

All of them, without exception, nod at Sam, and Dean thinks that’ll be enough, but then one, a wiry man with lobster-red skin, sees Dean and yells out something in Creole, but which Dean hears as, “Who’re you bringing to our gathering, _poto mitan_? This here’s for the family and he ain’t one of us.” 

Dean bristles, because he’s Sam’s family, not them, but Sam lays a hand on Dean’s chest, holds him back. 

“He’s wearing the charm of Damballah,” Sam says. “With the sign of Karrefour on the reverse and a vévé of Karrefour to help him understand.” A few murmur at that, especially when Sam adds, “And the sign of Karrefour protects him from Marinette.” 

The wiry man gives Dean a sharp-eyed look while someone else, a girl, young, asks, “She ride him?” 

“But good,” Sam replies immediately, and the murmurs turn to whispers. “The trinity threw her off, but he’s been bridled by a Petro loa and we all know what that means. He belongs here, just as much as any of us, especially with what we’re here to talk about.” 

Instead of making the people there relax, that seems to make them tense up, look at one another, start talking instead of whispering. There’s too much, too many people speaking at once for Dean to make everything out, but they’re talking about death, about change, about _war_, and he tries to step forward, forgetting that Sam’s hand is still on his chest. 

“He don’t like what we’re talking about,” the man says, calling out over the others to Sam. “Seems to me he ain’t one of us at all.” 

The clearing goes silent, and Sam steps forward, tattoos on his chest and back undulating with the movement. In the moonlight, it looks as if the snakes are moving, as if the inked-on bones are breaking and reknitting themselves together, as if the lines and curls are flowing over Sam’s skin, down his arms. 

“And what must I do to convince you?” Sam asks, voice low, quiet, though it carries in the stillness. “I, your _poto mitan_, must explain myself to you? Must prove myself to you? It’s my right to bring him here. _He is one of us_.” 

A woman shakes her head, curls flowing over back. “If he won’t let a loa ride him, he isn’t one of us. It doesn’t matter that you stopped it, _papalwa_; he doesn’t look as if he’d let any of the Petro put him to bridle given the choice.” 

Sam can’t argue with that and Dean knows it, so Dean’s not surprised when Sam asks again, “What must I do to convince you to let him stay?” as if they’d better come up with a way, and quickly.

The air around Dean heats up, scalds his skin, and he can feel sweat building at the base of his spine, prickling salt-slick on his back. 

“Why are we here?” someone else asks. 

“Marinette’s broken truce,” Sam says, simply. “She attacked an _asogwe_. She’s going after Erzulie’s horses, all of them.” 

There’s silence for a moment, then someone Dean can’t see, someone hidden in the shadows, says, “If ‘Zulie Dantor take ‘im in, then we let him stay.” 

People start nodding, and someone else, someone with a thin, strained voice, says, “If she willing to take in one of Marinette’s chosen and nothing happens, let the boy stay.” 

“Sam, what does that mean?” Dean asks, low, but not low enough, because people start laughing. To Dean’s ears, they sound like hyenas, ready for the kill. Sam doesn’t say anything, so Dean asks again, gets close enough to leave his breath on Sam’s ear. “What are they talking about? Look, if it’d be easier for me to just go, I will. I don’t like it, but I will.” 

Sam still doesn’t say anything, but he nods once, more at the people than at Dean’s words, and takes Dean by the hand, drags him to the middle of the clearing. People scatter as they come, forming a loose circle around the edges, looking halfway as if they might be ready to run into the trees if something unexpected happens. 

“What are we doing?” Dean asks.

“What we have to,” Sam says. 

Dean’s about ready to argue with that, ready to say he doesn’t need to stay, he can keep an eye out on things from the trees where no one’ll be able to see him, and then something in the air changes and he freezes, trying to figure out what’s different. 

Sam’s eyes close. His chest rises and falls, rises and falls again, and then a slow smile glides across his lips, the smell of vanilla and perfume wafting out around the two of them. Sam tilts his head to the left, then opens his eyes, looking at Dean through his eyelashes. 

“We gonna fuck, child,” Sam says, his voice low, jazz-club smoky and whisky-smooth. He reaches out, trails one finger down Dean’s chest, and the smile grows as Sam steps closer. “The _chwal_ wanna see me take you in, hold you close and tight, before they be letting you stay, and my boy, he wanna have you here, so we gonna fuck.” The smile turns vicious, just for a split-second, so fast Dean almost misses it, and then Sam adds, “And after we done fucking, mebbe we gonna talk, child. I got some things I been wanting to say to you.” 

Dean swallows, can’t move, but he breathes, “Danny. Erzulie Dantor,” and feels goosebumps racing over his skin when Sam’s head moves, nods in recognition. 

“Now,” she says, speaking through Sam, nothing of Sam left in the sound, in the movements, the sure grip Sam’s fingers have on Dean’s belt, undoing his jeans. “We don’t gotta talk no more, not right now. You just let me do the work, child, and you enjoy it.” She leans forward, flicks her tongue over Dean’s earlobe, and murmurs, “We all know you wanting to fuck this boy. Ever since Cali, heya? And now he ain’t even gonna stop you.” 

“It’s not Sam,” Dean says, shaking his head, leaning back and away from her lips, from the callused fingertips stroking his stomach. “It’s not him, this isn’t right, it’d be like rape, I can’t.” 

Erzulie smiles, bares her teeth, and says, “Child, you ain’t got a choice. And don’t be worrying about the boy, now. He be doing what he needs to be doing, jus’ like always; he ain’t gonna go ‘gainst this.”

That doesn’t make Dean feel any better, but he finds himself being pushed to the ground, and he lands on his ass, legs sprawled, elbows in the dirt. He’s ready to get up when Sam—when Erzulie sinks to her knees and rests one hand right on top of Dean’s cock. 

“You let me do the work,” she says again, crooning in a sing-song tone that reminds Dean of Ati. 

Dean blinks, tries to separate Sam from the loa in his brother’s head, tries to field a protest of some kind, but then Sam’s lips are on his, and holy _fuck_ his brother knows how to kiss. Unless, and Dean doesn’t want to consider it, it’s Erzulie who has the skill, who’s grazing her teeth over Dean’s lip, whose tongue is flicking against his own, who has one hand on his jean-covered dick and the other under his shirt, playing with a nipple. 

It’s too much, too fast, and when she pushes him the rest of the way down, back on the ground, rocks and twigs poking in his back, uncomfortable, he doesn’t resist. Dean arches up, rubs his cock into her hand, rubs his chest against the warm expanse of skin above him, and when he doesn’t feel tits, when the chest is hard and muscled, Dean opens his eyes, sees Sam through a haze of femininity, remembers that this is his _brother_ and that people are watching with eagle-sharp eyes. 

“Sam,” he murmurs, but then there are lips on his again, one hand wriggling into his jeans, into his underwear, and when warm fingers touch his dick, Dean hisses his brother’s name, tries like hell to remind himself why this is wrong. 

“Don’t you move,” Erzulie whispers against his lips, then leans back. 

Dean’s about ready to ignore that, to skitter out of the way like a nervous virgin, but she grips his hips and stares him down, makes him swallow with the power and fury he can see in the back of her eyes. In that moment of compliance, she practically tears his jeans and underwear off, leaves them around his ankles so he can’t move. 

While Dean watches, Erzulie takes off Sam’s clothes, throwing them somewhere off to the side. “Be easier if I had a cunt,” she says, and a few laughs from the circle around them make their way to Dean’s ears. “But,” she adds, once the titters have died down, “there be a good reason we like ridin’ a trinity,” and stillness falls over the clearing again. 

Dean’s reminded, as she mentions the trinity, of seeing Sam between Sophie and Théo, his head thrown back, sweat shimmering over his skin, the way he sounded as he came, and it’s like he has no control when one hand reaches out, traces over the tattoos on Sam’s chest, following one black line as it curls and dances from collarbone across smooth skin, around one nipple, between a bone and a red-inked snake, flirting with Sam’s belly-button before dipping down to the hip. 

“There y’are, child,” Erzulie whispers, and Dean can only watch, entranced, cock hard and aching, as Erzulie fucks herself open on two fingers, long column of throat illuminated by the moon reflecting off of the water. The sounds she’s making are somewhere between groans and whimpers, feminine noises from a masculine voice, and the combination, the crossing, of the two makes Dean swallow, makes him reach out again. His fingers fall on the scar this time, Sam’s other hip, knife-wound left from a hunter, and rage fills him, pure anger, that someone, anyone, would dare to try and kill his little brother.

“That’s it,” Erzulie murmurs, and she moves, straddles Dean’s waist, acts like she’s ready to lower herself onto Dean’s cock. 

Dean grabs her hips, says, “Wait,” and hears restless movement coming from the edges of the clearing. Erzulie looks at him, cocks an eyebrow, and he says, “No lube? No condom?” 

“The boy’s clean and the _chwal_ spoke, child, said nothing ‘tween me and you. We gotta worry ‘bout you?” 

“You shouldn’t just,” Dean starts to say, but Erzulie’s moved backwards, ass rubbing his cock, and it’s hard to think, impossible to think. “Sam?” he asks.

Erzulie runs one hand down Dean’s chest, says, “He ain’t worried, child. Been too long since he had a good fuck,” and moves, starts to lower herself onto his dick. 

“It’s been a couple _days_,” he says, finding the willpower to speak somewhere, almost impossible with this tight heat around his cock, drawing him inside, settling onto him. He can hear the laughter, but doesn’t care, not when she settles on him, his balls brushing her skin, smile on her face, eyes closed. 

It could almost be Sam, sitting there, and the thought, combined with the way she slides up and then down again, makes Dean groan, makes him throw his head back against the dirt, tighten his fingers in the grooves of her hips as he kicks his clothes off. 

“Couple days ‘s a couple days too many,” she says, and it’s the last thing for a while. 

\--

Once the sliding gets easier, once Sam’s hole is opened more, the rhythm picks up. Dean doesn’t want to consider how much this has to be hurting Sam, whether or not Sam’ll be able to walk straight or sit down without wincing, so he doesn’t, just gives in to the pace Erzulie’s setting, hard and fast, almost on the border of painful. 

It’s like her fingernails are sharper than Sam’s, somehow, as they hook into Dean’s skin, and Dean knows he’s leaving bruises on Sam’s hips, but he can’t bring himself to care. 

Erzulie’s letting out a string of words, some of which penetrate this haze around Dean, enough so he can hear the filth pouring out of her mouth, “Fuck me harder, gonna ride you so hard you be rubbed raw, come on, _masisi_, ain’t nobody else here gonna fuck me, just you,” and it’s almost enough, not quite but _almost_ enough to make him come. 

His head aches, he feels the same pain from the night before, like nails drilling into his skull, but before he can get worried about it, Erzulie leans down and clamps her teeth on his neck, sucks and nips and tongues his skin, and Dean hears her murmur, “He ain’t yours no more, sister,” before the haze around him doubles, then triples, turning his vision pink, red, silver. 

Dean comes with a groan and rides out the orgasm with his eyes closed, with one hand digging into Erzulie’s hip, the other halfway sunk into the dirt, fingers clawed, tight. 

Once he catches his breath, he hears one of the people on the outside of the circle say, “He done it. Good enough?” 

Someone else, a different voice from across the circle, says, “But she ain’t.” 

Dean looks up, sees Erzulie looking back at him. His eyes drift lower, over the tattoos, down to Sam’s cock, hard and leaking. “Oh, nuh-uh,” Dean mutters, and reaches up, wraps his hand around Erzulie, around his brother, and starts jerking. 

Erzulie clenches around him, head thrown back, hair sticking to her skin in damp curls that mirror the tattoos curling around her elbows, around her neck. “Yeah, child,” she murmurs, voice as damp as her skin, as hot around him as her ass. “Come on, do right by Danny.” 

They both groan when she comes, her low and throaty, him surprised, feeling her clench around him, milk him dry even though he’s done already. 

Only after her come’s drying on her belly, on Dean’s stomach, do people move in from the edge of the clearing, help Erzulie stand up, let her lean on them while she gets her bearings, figures out the aches in her legs, her thighs. One man, eyes bright and manic, gets on his knees and starts licking her stomach as a woman kneels behind her, spreads her ass and tongues Dean’s come out of Erzulie. 

Dean’s watching, frozen, mind blown and broken as Erzulie’s shaking and shivering, people crawling around her feet, licking and biting at her. He wants to stop it but doesn’t know how, so when two people come to him, offer him their hands, he takes them, lets them pull him up. 

“You one of us,” the man on Dean’s left says, and it takes Dean a minute before he puts two and two together, realises this is the same man who challenged his presence to begin with. “Erzulie Dantor take you in, you one of us.” 

They help Dean over to the edge of the clearing, near the water, and while Dean’s worrying about gators, sitting there on a half-rotted tree trunk, the rest of the circle gradually moves. He doesn’t know why, wonders if he should be worrying about the vodouisantes more than gators, but as they bring Erzulie over, obsequious to both the loa and the horse, he realises that they’re including him in the gathering, moving to accommodate him, thoughtful even as the angry tension from before seeps back into the clearing. 

“Why are we here, Erzulie?” one woman finally asks. “Marinette broke truce, we should be out hunting down her horses and taking her territory.”

“Because us Petro got a message for y’all,” Erzulie says, sitting down next to Dean with a grimace, shifting herself. “Y’all ain’t going nowhere, ain’t doing nothing.” 

Silence for a moment, followed by cacophony. 

“The hell you talking ‘bout, ‘Zulie?” one man finally says. “Expect us to let Marinette get away with killing our own, coming in our territory and picking us off? Expect us to sit at home with our loa and not do nothing?” 

Erzulie pins a dark and dangerous gaze on the man, who growls back, uncowed. “Y’all ain’t gonna be sitting ‘round doing nothing,” she says, sneering. “And no one gonna let Marinette get away with what she done. _Poto mitan_ and us loa, we gonna take care of her. We just need y’all to stay put while we do.”

“All respect, Erzulie,” one woman says. 

Erzulie snorts, leans forward, and Dean blinks because he’s just now realised he and Sam, they’re still naked. Erzulie doesn’t care, seems secure enough, comfortable enough in her nakedness to take on twenty other people, but Dean’s suddenly awkward, nervous, hates the way he feels, like he’s been stripped bare in front of these people and found just barely good enough. 

“Y’ain’t respecting nothing if you arguing,” Erzulie says. “Now sit down, shut up, and listen to ‘Zulie ‘fore I go letting the _poto mitan_ beat you down like you ain’t got no sense.” 

\--

They talk for hours, sit there while the night gets darker around them then lighter again, sun lighting up the sky to the east, through the trees. Dean’s cold, even in the damp heat, shivers through the night, no matter how close Erzulie gets to him, how tightly she presses her body to his side. 

The discussion’s finally done, everything argued out to the vodouisantes satisfaction, and the two of them are alone by the time Erzulie finally slides away, into the back of Sam’s eyes, after promising to have their own talk later, she’s tired. 

“You get what you wanted?” Dean asks, uncomfortably aware that Sam’s naked next to him, thigh pressed to his own, one hand still setting lightly on Dean’s leg, fingers curled in the short, wiry hair near Dean’s cock. He clears his throat, and looks at Sam. 

Sam returns the look with added amusement, makes a show of moving away, and he stands with a wince as he goes to search for their clothes. 

“We’re still alive, aren’t we?” Sam asks in return. 

Dean can’t really argue with that. 

\--

Dean drives back to the bed-and-breakfast while Sam’s on the phone with Kate. She’s yelling, lots of swearing, but even from the other side of the car, Dean thinks she sounds relieved, worn-out and wrung dry. Sam tells her something in French before he hangs up to the sound of her shouting and they both walk through the doorway in silence. 

Miranda’s at the desk, raises an eyebrow at their appearance but just asks, “Kate know?” 

“Just got off the phone,” Sam replies, before adding, “Don’t wake us up for anything. Please.” 

She laughs, and the sound follows them upstairs to the room. 

Dean unlocks the door and pushes it open, doesn’t wait for Sam to come in, just goes over to his bed and falls down on it, face-first. “Sleep for a week,” he mutters, and falls asleep to the sound of Sam scrabbling through one of their bags, exhaustion dragging him past concern into slumber. 

\--

The return to consciousness is a slow journey for Dean. The first thing he’s aware of is his nudity, the second the rasp of cotton sheets over his skin, over his half-hard dick. He stretches, opens his eyes, and frowns when he sees that he’s in bed, lying with his head on the pillow, body under the covers. He doesn’t remember getting undressed, doesn’t remember shifting, doesn’t remember anything except for collapsing onto the bed, and he sits up, worried. 

Sam’s lying in his bed, on his stomach, back to Dean, face tilted toward the window, and Dean gets distracted for a moment by the play of ink over Sam’s back, the way his muscles tense and relax as he moves. Dean’s cock twitches, seems to perk up as Dean thinks about how Sam’s skin felt under his hands, how Sam moved, rode his dick so hard Dean thought it was going to fall off, but he stops that thought, reminds himself that Sam’s his brother and that the person who fucked him last night was a loa, not family. 

It doesn’t help when Sam rolls over, opens sleepy eyes, and says, “Was up for a while after you passed out. Got you in bed. More comfortable this way. Go back to sleep,” and takes his own advice, snores coming out of his mouth a few minutes later. 

Dean watches, looks over and checks the lock, looks down at his dick and shrugs. “Sorry,” he mutters. “Maybe later.” With fans blowing on him and Sam, with the window open and the sound of the bayou creeping in with a slight breeze, Dean settles back down, closes his eyes, and goes back to sleep.

\--

Sam’s gone when he wakes up, but Dean’s not worried, not yet, not when Sam’s clothes and bags are all over the place, looking like some kind of whirlwind. Dean leans over, snags his phone off the nightstand, and checks his messages, reads one from Sam that says ‘_Kate’s_.’ 

Dean rolls his eyes but takes his time as he wakes up, knowing that Sam’s safe enough for now. He trusts that Sam has this vodou thing under control, which is weird enough, but he trusts the little scrapper of a chick to have his brother’s back, and after only knowing Kate for a few hours, that’s just piling more on the weird-o-metre. Not that anything’s made sense since he hit California, but now Dean’s starting to just go with it. Not like he can do anything else, unless that something else is apparently fucking his little brother. 

Just like that, his dick moves from half-hard to ready-to-go, and it’s a sign of how truly fucked up things are when he can close his eyes and _know_ what Sam’s lips taste like, what kind of noises Sam makes when he comes, how Sam feels, tight and warm around him. Just like that, hand around his cock, he’s coming, and Dean flops back when he’s done, stares at the ceiling before saying to himself, out loud, “I am so screwed.” 

He wipes off his hand on the corner of the sheet and falls back asleep, lulled by the orgasm, by the heat, by the sounds of people moving in the house.


	7. Chapter 7

A pillow hits his face, and Dean grunts, picks it up and throws it somewhere else, it doesn’t matter where, just so long as it’s not on his face. There’s nothing, then the pillow lands on his face again a minute later, this time accompanied by an instruction to “Get up, you lazy fucker. Have you seriously been sleeping all day?”

“For being so smart,” Dean says, moving the pillow, curling up with it, still not opening his eyes, “you sure ask the stupidest fucking questions sometimes.”

There’s a snort, one that doesn’t sound like Sam, and Dean cracks an eye open, can almost make out the blurry figure of Kate, who blows a kiss at him when he groans and laughs when he covers his face with the pillow. 

“We’ll wait downstairs for you,” Sam says, and drags a protesting Kate out of the room. 

Dean rolls out of bed, sheet wrapped around his hips, and makes his way to the bathroom, takes a quick, hot shower, and walks back to the room for clothes. Once dressed, he goes downstairs and sees Sam and Kate sitting across from each other in the small sunroom, leaning towards one another, heads bent and close. Dean feels something twist in his stomach, but when he gets closer, they look up at him, no guilt or surprise on their faces, and he realises that they were just talking. 

“’M up,” Dean says, rubbing one hand over his eyes as he sits down on the couch next to his brother, ignoring the way Sam’s presence, so close, makes his cock twitch, makes his blood pound heavy through his veins. “What’s going on?” 

Sam exchanges looks with Kate, and says, “There’s a meeting tonight. A few people will be coming here. Miranda’s already offered us the back room to use.” 

Dean looks back and forth between his brother and Kate, and finally says, “Okay,” slowly, missing what’s going on. “That doesn’t explain why Kate’s here. No offence,” he adds hastily. She waves a hand, almost imperious, and Dean turns back to Sam, ready for an explanation. 

“It’s a strategy meeting,” Sam says. 

Kate snickers, says something under her breath, and when Dean raises an eyebrow, she says, “War tribunal or something, right? Fucking ridiculous.” 

Dean looks back at Sam, who shrugs and says, “Just five or six of us. You can’t be there,” and before Dean can argue, after Dean’s stiffened and opened his mouth to speak, Sam says, “That’s why Kate’s here. You two should get to know each other.” 

“Why?” Dean asks, question popping out of his mouth before he can stop himself. He looks at Kate, whose eyes are gleaming, liquid brown and amused. 

“She’ll be coming with us,” Sam says. “We’re leaving tomorrow. I need to talk to some people and go find Marinette. Kate’s coming with us.” 

The tone of voice Sam’s using leaves no room for arguments, so Dean just leans back in his chair and asks, “Why?” The two exchange looks again, something that’s starting to piss Dean off a little, though Kate speaks up before he can say anything about it. 

“I’m empathic,” she says, serious. “Fucking bitch’ll come after two of us, even if we’re with the _poto mitan_. One’s not enough, but an empath and a hunter? Yeah, she’ll fuck with the world if she can get us both.” 

Dean blinks, says, “We _want_ her to come after us?” 

“When we’re good and ready,” Sam replies. “Then we’ll teach Marinette a lesson about messing with my family.” 

Dean looks at his brother, sees Sam looking back at him, eyes deep, furious, but still as well, hunter outwaiting the prey. It makes him swallow, and when he looks at Kate, he sees that she’s seen the look in Sam’s eyes as well, except that she’s smiling, not at all nervous.

\--

Sam’s apparently told Kate everything about all of the Winchesters, so when conversation turns stilted, both lost in thought about what might be going on downstairs, two Rada horses, three Petro horses, and Sam deep in planning, Dean mentions a prank Sam played on him, or some hunt they were involved in, and things smooth over. 

His first impression of Kate still holds, that beach-bunny vibe, like she’s soaking in the heat that lingers around them, not letting it push on her and wring her dry, and his last one as well, her sharp angles, coarse energy, but she’s charming and has a razor-sharp wit. 

She knows a lot about vodou even though she keeps herself away from it, and what she tells Dean chills him to the core, knowing that Sam’s involved in this. More than once, he’s caught himself gaping at her while she laughs at his shock or his amusement, but he doesn’t mind because he feels comfortable with her, like there’s something familiar about her. 

He finally asks about the empathy, and Kate shrugs, says, “Sam figured it out, I guess. I don’t fucking know.” At Dean’s look of inquiry, she says, “Keeps things too fucking close sometimes. I said something about my fucking stepmother,” and she stops, seeing Dean’s face pale. 

“Your mother died in a fire,” he says. 

Kate frowns, says, “How the fuck’d you know that? You and Sam both, it’s fucking _freaky_. Yeah, she died in a fire, in my own fucking nursery.”

The children. What the demon said about the children, the kids with gifts—Kate’s one of them, can sense emotions, that’s what Dean’s been sensing about her, that connection to them, to Sam, more than just what happened with her and the loa. 

“Bet you won’t fucking tell me anything either,” she says, half question.

Dean shakes his head, says, “If Sam hasn’t, I won’t,” and then Dean pauses. What if Sam doesn’t know about the demon? What if he doesn’t know that there are more like him? But that’s not right, can’t be possible, because Sam wrote the charm, knew what Dean was going to do, even knew where everything was going down. “Keeps things too fucking close,” he mutters, and Kate nods in agreement.

\--

The conversation turns light after that, nothing too serious, and it’s nearly sunrise when Sam finally walks into the room, closes the door behind him and leans on it like he needs help holding himself up. Dean jumps up immediately, moving to help his brother, and Sam takes it, lets Dean guide him to the sofa. Sam grunts in thanks, sits down and tips his head back, eyes closed. 

Something’s different, though it takes Dean a minute to realise that there’s a lump on Sam’s arm, under the long-sleeved shirt. He takes Sam’s hand, rolls up the sleeve, and sees bandages covering the skin on the bottom of Sam’s arm from elbow to wrist. 

“Sam?” he asks, quiet, and Kate moves next to Dean, peers down at Sam. 

Sam doesn’t say anything, doesn’t move, so Kate peels one edge of the tape off and lifts the bandage off, eyes widening. 

Dean shakes his head, stares at the red and inflamed skin, the curling black lines of a vévé tattooed right onto Sam’s arm, and asks, “Why the new tattoo?” 

“It’s not just one,” Kate says, voice hushed. She lifts Sam’s other arm, mirrors her actions from before, and reveals another tattoo, one that’s different, sweeps over Sam’s skin and dips into the curve of his elbow. “There’re two. One for Karrefour and one for Ti-Jean.” She pauses, shakes her head, and asks, “Sam? Why do you have vévés for the black magic Petro on you?” 

It’s bad enough just hearing the names of those two loa after everything Kate’s told him, worse when Dean digests what she called them, black magic loa, but she didn’t swear, not once, and that means something, means something _bad_.

“Sam?” she whispers, before reaching up, stroking his cheekbone and asking, “_Poto mitan_?” 

Like an invocation, Sam shudders, blinks, comes out of whatever trance he was in. Dean doesn’t like it, doesn’t like that the vodou title is the thing Sam responded to, but he’ll take what he can get. 

“Tell us what happened,” Dean orders, pushing Kate aside gently and kneeling at his brother’s side, one hand on Sam’s thigh. 

“We have to leave,” Sam murmurs. He tries to push himself up, but Dean places his hand on his brother’s chest and holds Sam there. “Dean, we have to leave.” 

Dean shakes his head, says, “Why? You’re not in any shape to travel, Sam. We’ll stay, you can sleep.” 

“I’ll sleep in the car.” Sam looks at Kate, briefly, who lowers her eyes, and then he looks back at Dean. 

Dean’s taken aback; he’s never seen anything other than determination or the loa in Sam’s eyes, but now he sees fatigue, fear, the need for an ending, either to the war or to life, and that scares Dean enough to have him stand up, say, “We’ll pack. You can sleep in the backseat. Where are we heading?” 

Kate narrows her eyes, eyes flipping back and forth between the two brothers, but doesn’t say anything as Dean motions for her to start packing their things up. 

“Biloxi first,” Sam murmurs. “Then north to St. Louis and Chicago.” 

“And the final showdown?” Dean asks, putting weapons into their bags and duffels with practiced efficiency. 

Sam shakes his head, closes his eyes. Dean’s eyes are drawn to his brother’s arms, red and aching, and he clenches his teeth as he turns away, meets Kate’s eyes.

\--

Dean doesn’t know who Sam talks to in Biloxi, doesn’t know what happens or why they’re there. 

He and Kate wait in the car outside of a small hardware store for fifteen minutes before Kate turns to him and asks, “You’re his fucking brother, man.” 

Dean gives her a quick look, fixes his eyes back on the store door, shrugs as if to say, ‘_Yeah, so?_’

“So why do you fucking look at him as if you’d like to fucking eat him?” 

Dean swallows, turns to Kate, and says, “What?” The protest sounds weak to his own ears and he holds back a flinch. 

“It is _all-fucking-over you_, Dean. Everything you do, every time you look at him or touch him or, fuck, every time you’re in the same fucking room. It’s like you wanna fuck him so bad, you can’t think straight.” She pauses, glances at the store, and says, “So why don’t you?” 

Dean chokes on his breath, sputters and turns wide eyes to Kate. “_What?_” he asks, once he finds his voice. “Dude, he’s my brother. That’s incest, that’s illegal, that’s, just. No.” 

“Methinks the man doth protest too fucking much,” Kate says dryly, before looking over Dean’s shoulder and saying, “You done, Sam?”

Dean turns around too fast and hits his knee on the steering wheel, seeing Sam peering in the window. 

“Yeah,” Sam says, giving Dean a funny look before opening the back door and sliding in, stretching out. “We’re ready to move on. St. Louis next. It shouldn’t take long.” 

\--

They’re in and out of St. Louis, on their way to Chicago, in a week. Sam was right, it didn’t take long, but it feels longer, dragging Kate along with them. She’s giving Dean over-the-top looks every chance she can get, which makes it pretty damn impossible for Dean to try and ignore the way watching his brother makes him feel. Sam must know what’s going on because he never asks, just watches them both and smiles, unless he’s out doing something with vodouisantes or whoever he came here to see. Dean hates it, hates that Sam won’t tell him what’s going on, hates more that Sam doesn’t let Dean into these meetings or rituals or whatever he’s doing. 

Sam takes off, half the time leaving Dean and Kate in a motel room or restaurant, half the time making them wait in the Impala outside of a house or a business, and disappears inside for fifteen minutes, half an hour, sometimes longer. He never looks happy going in and he always looks tired coming out, and by the end of the third day in St. Louis, Dean puts his foot down. 

“Three meetings a day, no more,” he says, over dinner at some kind of dingy suburban bar, peanut shells on the floor, unexpectedly good burgers on the table. “You’re running yourself ragged, Sam.” 

“Your brother’s fucking right,” Kate adds, before slamming back a shot of whisky with a grimace. “And you being so fucking tired means I might as well sleep in the same fucking room; you’re too fucking tired to fuck. We could save our fucking money.” 

Dean swallows wrong, ends up choking on his beer, and Sam and Kate watch him, both smiling, as he recovers, though her smile is fondly exasperated and Sam’s is pointed, hot. 

“No need to worry,” Sam says, and Dean hates his brother in that second, for the way Sam’s calmly eating, hasn’t responded at all, either way, to Kate’s words. “We’re done here. We can leave tomorrow and go on to Chicago.” 

\--

They sit and talk for a while, nothing too serious, stories of when Sam and Kate first met, of when Sam was in Louisiana visiting and nearly got his arm bitten off by a gator, when Kate got thrown out of a library for foul language. It’s a good time, lots of laughs, Dean learning a little bit more about what happened to Sam in the three years his brother was gone, and his guard’s down, he’s relaxed. 

Kate smiles at him when they get back to the motel, and before Dean can say anything, before he can ask about the look in her eyes, she says, “I’ll sleep in the extra room tonight,” and leaves, shutting the door, locking Dean in with Sam, just the two of them. 

“I don’t know what she,” Dean says, but then he turns to face Sam and stops, mid-sentence. 

Sam’s sitting on the edge of the bed, looking at Dean with resignation in his eyes, and Sam looks so tired, so defeated, it’s almost enough to make Dean nauseous. 

“You want me,” Sam says, and with the truth out there, so blunt, so plain, Dean just stares. “You want to fuck me, I want you to fuck me. If you want to ignore that, focus on everything else, that’s fine and I’ll accept it. But I’m tired of watching you watch me, and if you’re never going to make a move, let me know so I can stop wondering, okay?” 

Dean blinks, stands there, and holds Sam’s gaze until Sam stands up, turns away and heads for the bathroom. The door clicks closed, but not locked, and when the shower switches on a moment later, Dean huffs, goes to leave, opens the front door and freezes, sees Kate sitting on the small sidewalk, smoking. 

“You’re a fucking pussy, Dean Winchester,” she says without turning around, blowing smoke rings into the air. 

Dean slams the door, can hear her laughing, and he feels trapped, Kate and her too-knowing eyes on one side, Sam and his open invitation on the other. Dean sits down, bounces one foot on the floor, and then stands up again, opens the bathroom door and goes inside, puts the toilet lid down, sits on it. 

He doesn’t say anything for a long moment, but he knows that Sam knows he’s in there, and his question breaks the silence between them. “Why’d you leave?” 

There’s a sigh from the other side of the shower curtain, and Sam says, “I told you both I was going to. Showed you the acceptance letter and everything. You can’t tell me you forgot the argument.” 

“Yeah,” Dean says, “but you didn’t leave for months, just glared at Dad and stopped talking to me.”

The sound of shampoo being squeezed out of a bottle, followed by Sam speaking, and it’s as if Dean’s body has finally figured out that Sam’s on the other side of that thin curtain, silhouette almost visible, wet and naked, because he almost misses what Sam says in the sudden rush of absolute need and want coursing through Dean’s veins.

“Dean, I got my letter in April. School didn’t start until August, and we were in Tennessee. I couldn’t leave just like that; I had nowhere to go and the country to cross by myself. When I left, it was three days before the dorms opened and we were in Colorado. That’s a hell of a lot closer.” 

“Did you mean it?” Dean asks, half-wondering just how he and Sam are related, because even Dean didn’t consider the dorm issue, where Sam would have lived, and the thought of Sam having to fend for himself in San Francisco, eighteen and alone and penniless, gives him chills. “After you and Dad.” 

Sam pulls the curtain back enough to look at Dean, serious even with his hair slicked back and sudsy, water tracking out channels on his shoulders and chest, tattoos gleaming. “When I asked you to come with me, or at least visit me? Fuck, Dean, you think I would’ve said something like that if I didn’t mean it? But you didn’t say anything, so I guess I figured you wouldn’t. It’s not like I was trying to disown you and Dad, I just, I needed something more solid, something more consistent. I never even changed my phone number.” 

Dean holds Sam’s gaze, can’t hold it, looks away and hears the curtain close, hears Sam rinsing out his hair, scrubbing at his scalp. 

“Okay,” Dean says, breathing out through his nostrils. “Okay,” and he gets up, leaves the bathroom, sits on one of the beds and leans forward, elbows on his knees, fingers rubbing his eyes. 

It’s almost painful to consider, that he could’ve gone to see Sam any time he wanted, that Sam was going to keep talking to his family while he was at school, maybe even hunting, he just needed a home base, something more permanent than the back seat of the Impala and state highways. That he and John were so stubborn, so hurt, when they should’ve called, should’ve done _something_, anything, it makes Dean feel uncomfortably guilty, especially when the thought pops up that, if he or his father had been there, Sam wouldn’t be in the mess he is now. 

The shower shuts off and Sam walks out of the bathroom a couple minutes later, clean pair of jeans unbuttoned but zipped up, hanging off of Sam’s hips, showing the top edges of a white pair of boxer-briefs. Sam’s not wearing a shirt, and his tattoos shift and writhe in the awful motel light as he stands in front of the table and makes a pot of motel coffee. 

Dean studies his brother’s back, the long clean lines of muscle, the broad shoulders, the curling lines of ink that cover almost every square inch. His eyes settle on the scar, that knife wound, and he says, “Tell me about the hunter who gave you that.” 

Sam turns around, cocks his head and leans against the table, shoves his hands in his pockets. 

“I was visiting a _houngon_ outside of New Orleans,” he says, eyes trained on Dean. Dean shifts under his brother’s gaze, skin prickling, but he doesn’t interrupt, doesn’t dare pull his eyes away from Sam’s. “He was a horse for Simbe and had the gift of second sight. I needed to learn some things about fortune-telling, some of the aspects of being ridden by Baron La Croix. We were walking home from his _hounfor_ one night, after dark, and it was as if his gift and my lessons kicked in at the same time. The hunter shot at us but we knew the bullets were coming, managed to drop before they hit us. He came at us with a knife after that, and I was careless.” 

Sam shrugs, turns to check the coffee as if that’s his entire answer, but Dean shakes his head, says, “You aren’t careless with knives. You like them too much. What really happened?” 

Sam sighs, moves to pour a cup of coffee, speaks with his back to Dean. “The hunter went after the _houngon_ first. I pushed him out of the way and took a strike that was meant for him. The knife didn’t go in too deep, but the hunter wasn’t expecting me to fight back. I got the knife and slit his throat, and Simbe rode the _houngon_ and healed me so I didn’t bleed out.” A short, sharp laugh, and Sam adds, “Loa couldn’t take away the scar, though.” 

Dean shivers, hearing Sam talk so dispassionately, so matter-of-factly, about killing a hunter with his own weapon, but he has to ask, “Who was it?” because he needs to know, and he knows beyond a shadow of a doubt that Sam took the time to find out the hunter’s name. 

Its not someone Dean’s ever heard of before, not that he knows a lot of hunters apart from the few that John let them visit with when they were kids, but Dean thinks he’ll never forget the name again. 

Sam turns back around, offers Dean a cup of coffee, and Dean takes it with a silent nod, sipping and grimacing at the taste, but drinking it down nonetheless. Sam looks at him over the rim of his own cup, eyes dark, focused, the way Dean’s used to them seeming now, rather than the defeated, worn-out look he saw just half an hour earlier. 

Dean lets his eyes fall, lets them linger on Sam’s tattoos, and as his gaze drops lower, he sees a bulge in Sam’s jeans, can practically see Sam’s cock harden. Dean swallows, looks up, sees heat in Sam’s expression, heat and control, as if Sam knows what he wants but won’t let himself take it. 

“Sam,” Dean says, almost surprised to hear how hoarse his voice is, to feel how dry his mouth and throat are. 

Sam raises an eyebrow, as if he’s saying, ‘_Yes?_’ waiting for Dean to carry on.

“In California, Pierre said,” Dean begins, then stops, unsure how to say what he wants to. Finally he just rolls his eyes at himself, and says, “Pierre said he fucked you, when some of the loa rode you. Did you. I mean, when Erzulie rode you and we were. How much do you remember? How much control do you have?” 

“I remember everything,” Sam says, taking his cup of coffee and sitting down on one of the chairs at the rickety table. “It’s not like demonic possession. It’s more like a, like a conversation. The loa use my voice, use my body, but I’m there every step of the way. Pierre’s a bokò, he and Ti-Jean got along well. I wasn’t ridden by Ti-Jean a lot, but when I was, the two of them would talk about magic and then fuck. It didn’t disturb Sophie or Théo, it didn’t disturb the other loa, it didn’t disturb me.” 

Dean nods, clears his throat and licks his lips, and asks, “And Erzulie? With me?” 

Sam smiles, faint change of expression, and looks down at the floor, at his feet, bare and peeking out from the frayed hem of his jeans. “She likes you, strange enough. Felt sorry for what happened to you and pissed off, too, until she had your cock. Then she was just enjoying herself.” 

It’s strange enough to hear Sam say the word ‘cock,’ even stranger to have it be in reference to Dean’s. “And you?” Dean asks, once he’s worked up the courage. 

“I said I want to do it again, this time with me in control of my body,” Sam says instantly. “If that doesn’t answer your question, I don’t know what the fuck will.” 

Dean snorts, trying to ignore how much his heart’s racing, how his stomach’s turning somersaults, how much blood just flew south to his dick. Just the fact that he’s considering it, he’s setting himself up to be hurt, Dean knows that. Once this mess is all taken care of, Sam’ll go back to San Francisco, to Théo and Sophie, will leave Dean alone again. 

Sam’s hand is on his cheek, and Dean blinks, because he didn’t realise he was that deep in thought, to miss Sam moving, kneeling between his legs and taking the Styrofoam cup out of his hand. 

“Sam,” Dean says, voice ragged. 

The hand on his cheek moves, until Sam’s finger is pressed against Dean’s lips, stopping Dean from saying any more. “You never used to think this much, did you?” Sam asks, leaning up, brushing his lips against Dean’s jaw. “I was always the thinker, remember? And while I was thinking.” 

“I was doing,” Dean whispers. “Dad yelled at us so much.” Dean leans down, takes Sam’s cheeks in his hands and knocks his forehead against Sam’s. He takes a deep breath, then asks, “Is it bad that I don’t care whether or not this is right?”

Sam’s other hand slides up Dean’s thigh, thumb reaching out to brush Dean’s cock, hard and trapped in his jeans. “It’s a relief,” Sam answers, just as quietly, and then tilts his head, presses his lips against Dean’s. 

It’s not a kiss, not really, just connection while Dean sorts through everything in his head, while Sam waits, but then Dean leans back, opens his eyes and smirks at Sam. Sam raises an eyebrow, then his expression changes as he goes sprawling on the floor, pushed backwards by Dean, who drops to his knees and crawls between Sam’s legs, hovering over his brother, staring at Sam’s eyes, which have gone deep and dark. 

“Gonna fuck you, Sam,” Dean breathes, before he’s kissing Sam, really kissing him, with teeth and tongue and lips, hands scratching down Sam’s chest before sliding back up, tracing out patterns in the tattoos. 

Sam’s arching, has his legs tight around Dean, is rubbing against Dean, fingers digging into Dean’s shoulders, and the noises he’s making, the ones that are all Sam, nothing and no one else, are the best sounds Dean’s ever heard. 

“Fuck later, come now,” Sam mutters, breathing the words into Dean’s ear before biting down on Dean’s earlobe, just as rough with Dean as Dean is with him. “Got all night, remember? _Tifi_ got a different room.”

Dean never would’ve pegged Sam for being loud and talkative during sex, but when he reaches into Sam’s underwear and curls his hand around Sam’s dick, the groan Sam makes, the sudden litany of words he lets loose with, they’re loud and lewd, accompanied by Sam fumbling with Dean’s jeans, yanking them open, shoving them down, clawing Dean’s underwear out of the way. 

Dean hisses, can’t stop a thrust when one of Sam’s hands wraps around his cock in turn, tight and squeezing as Sam strokes. “Fuck, yeah, Sam, like that,” Dean says, more a moan than speech. 

It’s fast and frantic, like both of them are teenagers again and like neither of them have had sex before. Dean comes first, practically fucking Sam’s fist, and he feels the sharp pang of teeth settling in the meat of his shoulder when Sam stiffens and comes, arching up into Dean again and again, riding out the waves of climax with his lips sucking bruises into Dean’s skin. 

“Fuck,” Dean says, flopping next to his brother on the floor, staring at the ceiling, strange water patterns on the stucco. 

“In a minute,” Sam says, trying to catch his breath, trying to reach over and find something to wipe the come off of his stomach and hand with. “Got all night.”

Dean hums, moves his head to the side, stares at his brother as he says, “’M tired, Sam.” He’s about ready to close his eyes, about ready to fall asleep right there on the floor, no matter how itchy the carpet’s going to seem under his back in about five minutes. 

Sam moves, though, hauls Dean up and practically throws him on the bed. He lands face-first but Dean can’t be angry about it, not when Sam starts pulling Dean’s clothes off and there’s a pillow under his head, the bed dipping under Sam’s weight.

“Try not to fall asleep,” Sam says wryly, smoothing a hand down Dean’s back, cupping Dean’s ass before Sam shifts and Sam’s hands are holding Dean’s hips. 

Dean’s got a smart-ass comeback on the tip of his tongue, but then he feels Sam’s nose against the small of his back a moment before Sam’s tongue flicks out and licks up the sweat gathered at the base of Dean’s spine, and all thoughts of words and questions flee his mind. 

“What’re you,” Dean starts to ask, but then Sam’s nose is trailing downwards and Sam’s hands are moving, spreading Dean’s ass. Dean’s cock is trying to be excited about this, especially when Sam starts licking around Dean’s hole. The moment Sam actually starts tongue-fucking him, Dean’s spine stiffens and his dick starts to harden, fill with blood, because fucking _hell_, this is dirtier than Dean ever thought his little brother had the potential to be, and, better than that, Sam’s _good_ at this. 

“Wanna hear you,” Sam murmurs, teeth nipping at the curve of Dean’s ass, one finger circling Dean’s hole while he’s talking. “Come on, Dean. Wanna hear how good it is, tongue in your ass, rimming you like this.” 

Sam goes back to work, and Dean does his best to let Sam know how good it feels, how wrong this is and how much Dean doesn’t care, not so long as Sam’s tongue keeps twisting inside of him, going deeper with every stroke, finger sliding in next to tongue. Dean’s trying to move, trying to hump the mattress, because his cock’s aching, leaking, but Sam holds him still so all Dean can do is writhe, move backwards, fuck himself on Sam’s tongue and fingers, because there are two fingers in him now, coaxed in with saliva and sweat, and Dean’s never been on the bottom like this before, but he wonders why, wonders why he never wanted to, when Sam’s finger slides against something that has his mind blanking out and his cock spurting out helpless streams of come. 

Dean gasps for breath, especially when Sam keeps going, keeps stroking until Dean’s done, like he’s milking Dean for everything Dean has. He turns Dean over then, hands wide and strong as they encompass Dean’s hips, roll Dean onto his back, gently. Dean looks at Sam with blown, uncomprehending eyes, as Sam dips his head and starts licking up the come smeared on Dean’s stomach, across Dean’s hips. 

“_Fuck_,” Dean whispers, one hand tangling itself in Sam’s long, sweat-damp hair, feeling the slow rasp of tongue against hypersensitive skin. 

When Sam’s done, he crawls up Dean’s body, presses a sleepy kiss to Dean’s forehead, and curls himself in on Dean. “Fuck later,” Sam mutters, yawning, and Sam’s snoring within minutes, gentle whuffs of air against Dean’s neck. 

Dean smiles, wraps one arm around Sam, and he says, “Never letting go, little brother,” as Sam’s smell, coffee bean bitter and chocolate smooth, floods his nose, his senses, and tugs him to sleep. 

\--

“About fucking _time_,” Dean hears, and he opens his eyes, groans at the amount of light in the room. He shakes his head, turns and buries his face in something warm and smooth, and it takes an arm around his waist before he realises his eyes are pressed against skin. 

“Aw, _tifi_, why’re you waking us up?” 

Dean blinks, stiffens as he remembers what happened before he fell asleep, that he must be curled into Sam, that Kate’s in their room, looking, seeing. He sits up fast, lets the room swim in his vision for a moment before he glares at the girl and asks, “How the fuck’d you get in here?” 

Kate laughs, holds up a key-card, and says, “The fucking spare, Dean. Though if you don’t fucking remember giving it to me before we went out last night, I assume Sam and you fucked like rabbits all night?” 

“No fucking,” Sam murmurs, and Dean looks down, lets his eyes linger on his brother’s back before he looks up at Kate again. “Getting to it. Go ‘way.” 

Kate laughs, sharp and short, and says, “We haven’t got the fucking time, Sam, remember? Gotta get to Chicago.” 

Sam sighs, rolls over, and while Dean’s eyeing the morning erection Sam’s sporting, his brother says, “Fine. We’ll hurry. Go away.” 

They don’t fuck, no time for it, though Dean thinks Sam resents that just as much as he does, even when they’re jerking each other off fast and dirty before taking turns in the bathroom, Sam going first. The room reeks of sex when they leave and Dean gives Sam a look that promises the next one will as well, if he has anything to say about it. Kate, who’d been in the room when Dean came out of the shower, snorts and keeps her mouth shut.

\--

They were in Biloxi for a day, took three in St. Louis, but Sam ends up going to one place on the outskirts of the city, spending an hour inside, and coming out with a grimace on his face. 

“We’re done here,” he says. 

Dean looks at Kate, who shrugs back, and he says, slowly, “That’s it? Just an hour?”

Sam slides into the back seat, rubs his forehead, and meets Dean’s eyes in the rear-view mirror. “Hate this fucking city. We’re done here, and to hell with them all.” 

Dean sees Kate shudder at Sam’s tone and he keeps from doing the same, just barely, because the venom in Sam’s voice sounds like liquid poison, and with the connection Sam has to the loa, Dean’s pretty sure he could damn someone to hell without a second thought. 

“Where to next?” Dean asks, impressed that his voice doesn’t catch, doesn’t give away how terrifying his little brother can be now. 

“We’re going to search out Marinette,” Sam replies, leaning back in the seat, closing his eyes and letting his legs fall open. “Drive south. She likes warm places.”


	8. Chapter 8

Dean drives into Kirklin, Mississippi, two days after they leave Chicago, late in the afternoon with the windows down. Sam’s sleeping in the back seat, looks exhausted with deep hollows under his eyes after two days of no sleep, having said something about preparations every time Dean or Kate asked him to take a nap, just for a few minutes. 

He’d been awake until they’d hit Greenville, then said, “Wake me up when we get to Kirklin,” and then had promptly fallen into a sleep so deep that the blasting Metallica hadn’t woken him up. Kate and Dean had exchanged looks, but neither of them had said anything, not even at the name of their destination, something they hadn’t known before that moment. 

Dean finds a motel just outside the small town, half-hidden in the woods, and Kate shakes her head when he comes back from getting two rooms. 

“No fucking way,” she says, looking into the forests surrounding them on all sides. “If this is where it’s fucking going down, I don’t care if you’re fucking for hours two fucking inches from my face, you are _not_ leaving me the fuck alone.” She stops, shudders, and says, more quietly, “Can you feel it?” 

“Something’s not right,” Dean answers, getting their bags out of the trunk, taking out enough guns and knives to arm a small militia. “I’m guessing it’s the bitch loa, but I dunno. Wake Sam up while I check out the room.” 

The room’s fine, Dean goes over every inch of it and then makes a fifteen minute job of salting the walls, windows, and doors, laying out graveyard dirt, burning sage to purify the air and taping runes and wards onto the walls. With that done, he goes outside, and stops. 

Sam’s gone, and so is Kate.

Dean’s looking around, cursing his brother, out loud and in his head, every swear word in every language that he knows, when he feels a familiar ache at the back of his skull. 

“Oh, fuck _no_,” he whispers, face pale, and even as he reaches out to steady himself on the wall, to pull himself back inside the protection of the motel room, he hears laughter slide into his head, fill up the spaces between his thoughts. 

“_Left you alone,_” he hears. “Poto mitan_ left you alone, silly little mortal, silly little horse. And you here, all ready and wide-open for me, the girl and my sister’s horse gone, playing rabbit-in-the-woods, hoping for help from Gran Bwa. Let’s have fun, my little mount. Let’s hunt._”

Dean’s eyes water, the ache in his head grows and deepens, threatens to break his skull in half, shatter his mind into pieces, and then everything goes black. 

\--

His eyes are open when he comes to, which is strange, because he didn’t open them. What’s even stranger is that he’s moving through the woods, knife in one hand, and when he tries to stop, to figure out what’s going on, his feet keep going. 

“Awake, are you? ‘Bout time, little mount; I pick ‘em strong, was starting to get worried about you.” 

Dean flinches—well, his mind does, not his body, it’s still moving, and he can feel himself forming the words, speaking them, feels air rush through his throat, catching modulations from his larynx, but it’s not him talking. 

And yet it is.

His first thought is that he’s possessed, that there’s a demon inside of him, using him, but after a few frantic seconds of struggling, he knows it’s not a demon. He can feel his body, he just can’t control it. He can feel the weight of the knife in his hand, can hear everything in the woods, the snap of every twig he steps on, every time his foot squelches deeper into the mud. He can even feel the heady sense of anticipation, like this is _him_ only not. From everything Dean’s heard of demon possession, it’s more like being trapped, isolated and sense-deprived in the mind, but this, this isn’t that. 

“Calm down, Dean Winchester,” he says, only there are different strands in his voice, echoes of someone who isn’t him. 

“_Marinette_,” he says, or tries to; it comes out in his head, echoes around his ears like he’s actually heard it, but he didn’t feel his lips move, didn’t breathe to speak. It’s so disorienting, so inherently _wrong_, he doesn’t know how Sam does it all the time, not to mention with more than one loa. 

He waits, wonders if she’s heard him thinking, but she doesn’t say anything, and Dean remembers what Sam said about this being more like a conversation. He thinks, maybe, she’s not able to read his mind, only hear what he’s saying, and that’s another difference between this and possession.

“Heya, it’s me. I can feel you fluttering. You try to relax, this shouldn’t take long. My sister’s horse, he’s leaving a hell of a trail for me to follow, him and the girl both.” Dean feels panic well up inside of him and Marinette starts to laugh. She pauses in her movement, gestures at some footprints in the mud, and says, “See? I would’a thought he’d be better than that, ‘specially after that trick he and my sister pulled at the gathering.” 

Dean studies the trail, wishes he could control his body to look around and see if there are other signs, but Marinette’s moving again, and it’s not until she’s looking from side-to-side that Dean realises what she’s missing. 

There are little signs left in the trail, the heel deeper than the toe, branches broken, that she thinks means Sam’s sloppy. Sam’s not, though, never has been, always took better to hiding than Dean did, and all of this, it’s a sign. Whatever Sam did, he did it on purpose, and Dean’s at once relieved and absolutely, heart-stoppingly furious. 

Dean keeps looking, scanning Marinette’s vision for any more signs, and if he’d been in control of his body, he’d freeze, seeing a five-spot on a tree to their left, like Sam taught him to find before their gathering with the Rada. A few feet later, there’s one on the right, and how Marinette’s missing these, Dean doesn’t know, doesn’t think she’d be ignoring them if she saw them. 

He’s trying to figure out what Sam’s doing, but then Marinette stops, crouches and creeps forward a little. She peers over a fallen log and Dean sees Sam and Kate sitting in the middle of a natural clearing, talking quietly, too quietly for Dean and Marinette to hear. He can feel his lips curve upwards, shifting the knife in his hand for a better, surer grip, and then Marinette stands up, steps over the log. 

“Well, well,” she drawls. “What have we here, hiding out in the middle of the forest like a pair of wild deer? My little empath, I’ve missed you.” 

Kate’s shaking, but she lifts her chin and says, “I’m not your fucking anything, you bitch.” 

Marinette laughs, Dean can feel her amusement, but then she turns to look at Sam, and Dean’s trying to fight Marinette with everything in him, all to no avail. 

“My sister’s horse,” she murmurs, head tilted to one side. “And trying to make a trinity in yourself, aren’t you, _poto mitan_? What you think Samedi and Legba Atibon are gonna do, I don’t know.” 

Sam smiles at her, eyes flashing, and he says, “Not the baron, not Ati. This here’s a Petro meeting, Marinette.” 

Dean can feel the loa flinch, doesn’t know why, and she looks around, obviously rattled. “There isn’t anything,” she begins to say, but then Sam’s smile grows and he says something in French, something that makes Marinette scream. Dean doesn’t know why, he didn’t feel anything physically, so he’s guessing it’s something relating strictly to the loa, and when Marinette blinks back tears, clears her vision, Dean sees five-spots glowing on the trees around them, sees something glowing on the ground. 

Marinette looks down, curses, and says, “Hoodoo. So I’m trapped here, little one. But if I am, so are you, and so’s your brother. You think you can win against him, your loa against me? Which one’s riding you, hm? My sister? Her husband?” 

Dean’s never seen this particular smile cross Sam’s lips before, and he hopes he never will again, because all he sees in the expression is death. Sam takes his shirt off, slowly, pulls it over his head, and Dean feels a flash of interest, longing, even regret from Marinette, once Sam’s skin is revealed. She studies his tattoos, makes a noise of disgust at one point, one of interest at another, but then Sam turns his arms, lets her see the underside, and she hisses in a breath. 

“Your sister, Erzulie Dantor,” Sam says, and it works like an invocation, because Sam starts giving off power, scented like perfume. “Her husband, Ogou, the warrior,” and now there’s the sound, faint, nearly audible, of war drums. “Simbe, the all-knowing, Dan Petro, the planter,” Sam goes on, and the air around them turns cool, like spring rain, before it grows heavy with the scent of metal and fire as Sam adds, “Ti-Jean, the dwarf.” Sam pauses, smiles, showing his teeth, and says, “And Karrefour, loa of the crossroads.” 

Marinette can’t breathe, is panicked, wild, as Sam stands there, the power flowing off of him in waves so thick they’re choking her. 

“And none of them are happy with you, Marinette.” Sam shifts on his feet, says, “Your sister especially. You’ve been on trial, you’ve been condemned, you’ve been thrown out of two of your unwilling horses, and you’re still causing troubles. Don’t think we didn’t notice your touch on the hunter. Don’t think we didn’t notice your presence at the gatherings. Don’t think we didn’t notice what you were doing in other Petro territories.”

“What can you do to me?” Marinette retorts. Dean can feel how unsteady she is, but she sounds calm, self-assured, and he wants to shake her, wants to tell his brother how unsettled she is. 

Sam smiles again, and Dean suddenly thinks that his brother could be one scary and intimidating son of a bitch if he wanted to be. He’s tall, confident, and even with the loa, even if he’s going through the same thing Dean is now, having conversations in his head, he looks like he’s ready to kill someone. 

“Your family’s petitioned Bondye for a binding,” Sam says, and Marinette’s mouth drops open. “He’s granted it, so long as they do it and keep tabs on you. So get ready, _sister_,” he spits. 

Marinette shakes her head, steps back, growls, “Never. I’ll never let you bind me,” and lifts the knife. She steps for Sam, but it’s Kate she grabs by the hair, Kate’s throat where she presses the knife. She’s close enough to Sam for Sam to do something, to touch her, but Dean knows Sam never will, not with Kate there, trapped, held hostage. 

“I’ll kill her. She’s mine, and I’ll kill her, spill her blood to give me power,” Marinette says. “Your little tricks won’t help when I take her gift.” Marinette bends her neck, breathes in Kate’s scent, licks a stripe up the girl’s neck. Dean can feel Kate shivering, feel her heart beating hummingbird-fast, but he can’t do anything to stop Marinette. 

Sam shrugs, and if Dean had been in control of his body, his jaw would have dropped, heart stopped. “I have six Petro loa riding me, Marinette. Do to her what you want, it won’t make a difference.” 

Kate cries, reaches out for Sam, but he doesn’t take her hands. 

Marinette falters, and when Sam steps backwards, away from Kate, she asks, “You would let her die? You’ve changed in the past years, little horse. There was a time you almost killed her yourself to keep me from riding her.”

“I do what I must, Marinette,” Sam says, lifting his chin. “Surely you can understand that. In the weight of things, if it takes her life to bind you, so be it.” 

It doesn’t look as if Sam’s going to do anything to save Kate, and Marinette’s hesitant for some reason, so Dean says, “_Don’t, please. She’s not part of this,_” desperation choking him, the sound of his voice filled with pleas, prayers. 

Instead of that helping, of pushing some advantage, Marinette starts to laugh, low and sultry. “I wouldn’t’ve believed it apart from your brother,” Marinette tells Sam, and even though Marinette’s in control, it’s Dean’s hand that slides the knife across Kate’s throat, Dean’s arm that gets covered with blood, Dean that lays the girl to the ground, eyes on Sam as Marinette kneels for a moment, carves a symbol into Kate’s forehead before standing up again. 

Marinette starts to chant, words designed to call up power from blood sacrifices, from the death of a favourite horse, words that cut through the middle of Dean’s grief, because he _liked_ Kate, even if she was harsh, a little too blunt sometimes. Marinette pauses, though, because nothing’s happening. 

“I don’t understand,” she says, and her puzzlement, her growing fear, is so thick that Dean can almost taste it. “I don’t understand. What did you do?” 

Sam’s not smiling, but there’s judgment glimmering in the back of his eyes as he shows her his arms again, the tattoos still healing on them. “Karrefour and Ti-Jean. Black magic Petro.” 

Marinette shakes her head, so violently that Dean almost sees stars. “No. No, that isn’t possible, she bled, no illusion is that good, and your brother, he,” and she stops. “He didn’t know either,” she whispers. “You’d do anything for them, wouldn’t you?” It’s like a sudden realisation, he can almost hear something in her click as her confusion turns to despair. 

“You’d do anything, no matter what they asked in return. He’s going to hate you for the trick. If you’d let me in the first time I came to you,” she says, then gives Sam a flirtatious smirk of invitation, adds, “If you let me in now, I’ll make sure he doesn’t remember. Think of what we could do, little mortal, you and me together, and he’d follow you, every step of the way.”

“I am _poto mitan_,” Sam says, implacable, ignoring her offer. “I carry the weight of _zo regleman_ on my shoulders. I do what I must. No loa can enter a horse uninvited and go without punishment. Now, Marinette,” and his voice hardens, “get out of my brother.” 

Sam starts chanting, and Marinette starts screaming, and as much as Dean wants to watch what’s happening, his head splits apart again and he blacks out.

\--

When Dean opens his eyes, the first thing he does is blink, and let out an, “Oh, thank God,” when his eyelids respond to the command. 

Kate’s head swims into Dean’s vision, through the massive headache he has, and he just looks at her in surprise when she grins, wide and toothy, and shoves a couple aspirin down his throat. 

“He’s awake!” she yells, and Dean winces, because the girl has lungs and his eardrums, his head, fuck, even his _skin_ hurts. 

Dean sits up, and the next thing he knows, Sam’s got one hand under Dean’s elbow, helping him move, lean against the headboard of the bed. Dean blinks to clear his eyes, sees Sam’s forehead furrowed, faint scratches all over his face, bangs sticking to his forehead. 

“Easy, Dean. You’re going to have a headache for a while, so take it slow,” Sam murmurs, like he understands how much pain Dean’s in. Sam turns, says something to Kate, too low for Dean to make out even with his hearing as hypersensitive as it is, and Dean hears the door click closed a moment later. Sam’s hand moves from his elbow to Dean’s face, and Sam studies Dean’s eyes for a moment before tipping his forehead against Dean’s, hand sliding down to Dean’s shoulder. 

“I’m sorry, Dean. I’m so, so sorry, but it had to be done. I couldn’t tell you, and I’m sorry, but it had to be done.”

Dean’s head aches. He lets Sam sit there, forehead pressed against Dean’s for as long as Dean can take it, but the contact, the pressure, it makes the pain worse. He moves his head, away from Sam, and Sam pulls back like he expected it. There’s a shutter in Sam’s eyes that Dean doesn’t like, but he’s too tired, too confused and achy to question it. 

“Do I have time to sleep?” Dean asks, throat aching at the rasp, as if he’d been screaming, and he flinches as he remembers Marinette using him, using his voice. 

“Yeah,” Sam says, and helps Dean lie down, covers Dean up and stands. “Sleep as long as you want,” he murmurs, and Dean’s eyelids slide down as Sam leaves. 

\--

Dean wakes up with a gasp, shaking off a nightmare in which he was trapped in his body for the rest of his life. He calms himself down before he can panic, though the sheets are damp and he’s sweaty, heart racing. With a swallow, he moves, gets up and goes to the bathroom, and stares at himself in the mirror. It’s the first time he’s looked at himself since Marinette rode him, used him, and he almost doesn’t recognise the face looking reflected back at him. 

He’s pale, drawn, effects of the nightmare, he thinks, but there’s a scab on the skin above his collarbone, some design crudely carved into the skin. He moves his arm, winces as the scab pulls, but it’s healing and healing fast, shouldn’t scar so long as it doesn’t break open. 

Dean takes a shower, quick and hot to loosen his muscles, and once he’s done and dressed, he opens the door, starts looking for Sam and Kate. It’s irrational, he knows, but he gets the feeling that if he’s alone, if neither of them are there, Marinette will be back and he’ll get trapped inside his mind again, trapped in a life that won’t ever end, unwilling horse to a spirit that wants to kill his brother. 

He doesn’t see them outside, but the car’s still there and they aren’t close enough to Kirklin for the two to have walked anywhere, so Dean goes into the lobby and doesn’t need to ask if his brother left a message, because he can see Sam and Kate through the glass of a door leading into what looks like a TV room. 

Sam’s sitting down on one of the chairs, and Kate’s straddling him, has her face buried in Sam’s neck. One of Sam’s hands is cupping her ass, the other’s rubbing circles on her back, and Sam’s eyes are closed, odd shadows covering his face. 

Dean swallows, backs away, tries to ignore the ache in his stomach as Sam leans, tilts his head, and kisses Kate’s forehead before saying something. 

“I hope that ain’t your girlfriend,” someone says behind Dean, and he turns, startled, sees the girl that checked them in pop her gum. 

“No,” Dean says, looking back at his brother. “No, she’s not.” 

\--

Dean goes back to the room and crawls into the other bed, flipping back the covers himself. It’s clear that Sam hasn’t slept in it, and Dean can’t stop himself from wondering if that’s because Sam’s been in Kate’s bed. He’s angry, wants answers, but, more than that, he’s tired, like however long he just slept for wasn’t enough. Dean checks the time, figures it’s the next day, wonders how Sam and Kate got him back here, and is just about to turn on the television when the door handle turns. 

He grabs a gun, aims it at the door, pleased to find his hand’s steady even after everything else that’s happened. 

Kate peeks her head around, says, “Fucking point that fucking thing somewhere else, would you?” and comes in the rest of the way once he does. Hands on her hips, she watches him put the gun down, and then asks, “How’re you feeling?” 

Dean snorts, says, “How are _you_ feeling? I thought I killed you.” 

Kate laughs, sits down on one of the chairs in the room, and says, “Yeah, well. If I’m dead, no one fucking told me. I’m fine, Dean. How the fuck are you?” 

“My head still aches,” Dean says after a minute, “but other than that.” He shrugs, looks down at the blanket, picks at a snag in the cloth. “What was the plan?” he asks after a minute, looking back up at her, feeling anger mix in with the shock, most of it muted, as if he doesn’t have the energy to be upset about anything. 

Kate studies him for a moment, finally replies, “Plan was exactly what fucking happened. Trap the bitch and get her out of you with as little pain as possible. Once that was done, the damn fucking loa cornered her and bound her. She won’t be bothering the fuck out of anyone for a while, that’s for fucking sure.” 

“How long have you known?” Dean asks, and at her puzzled look, he says, “About the trick. About what Sam was planning.” 

“Twenty minutes or so before you,” Kate says, “but that’s just a guess. You were in here checking things out, Sam nabbed me, put a fucking gag on me, and locked me in a closet. Next thing I know, he’s unlocking the door, has this great big fucking slice down his chest, a few more on his.” 

She trails off as Dean gets up, moves to the door with a blank look on his face, and says, “Dean, you don’t fucking _look_ very good. You _really_ don’t want to have this fucking conversation with your brother right now.” 

“Oh, I most definitely do,” Dean growls, and he stomps out of the room, intent on finding Sam. 

\--

Sam’s not in the lobby, not in the television room, not in the Impala, not in any of the other rooms in the motel. Dean’s debating whether or not to kill Sam and then resurrect him for answers or kill him, resurrect him, kill him again, and _then_ resurrect him for answers when he sees movement on the edge of the trees and freezes. 

Sam comes out of the woods a moment later, and as bad as Dean feels, as bad as Dean looks, Sam looks just as bad, just as tired, and his face is all scratched up. 

“The fuck happened to you?” Dean calls out, and Sam stops in his tracks, looks at Dean like he hadn’t even noticed Dean was there.

Dean stalks across the parking lot, across the grass, and when he gets closer to Sam, he rips Sam’s shirt off, eyes widening at what he sees. 

The tattoos on Sam’s arms look like they split open and bled, and there’s a large cut, looks like a knife wound, that goes from one shoulder to the opposite hip, looks deep and is, judging by the number of stitches someone’s sewn into Sam’s skin. Smaller scratches litter the rest of Sam’s chest, his sides and back, his neck and face, a few mirroring curves of tattoos, others scattered all over the place. 

There’s a small but deep gash above Sam’s left eyebrow, and Dean lifts a hand, runs his thumb lightly over the cut, across the stitches. Sam stands there, doesn’t flinch, eyes focused, trained on Dean, muscles tense but ready to be used. 

“What happened?” Dean asks, gently now, because he knows that look in Sam’s eyes, the one that’s wary, watching, waiting. It’s a look Sam used to give to their father, one Dean hasn’t seen from his brother since before Sam left for San Francisco. 

Sam looks away, steps backwards, but when he answers Dean, he looks right at Dean’s face. “Kate, in the woods, she was an illusion. Once you passed out, I pulled Marinette out of you and the loa and I bound her.” 

“How’d you know I,” Dean starts to say, but he shakes his head, says, “Nevermind. Freaky vodou shit, I get that, and I get the illusion. Can’t say I’m happy about it, but it saved our lives, so I’ll get over it. But you didn’t answer the question, Sam. How’d you get hurt?” 

“I did answer,” Sam retorts, though there’s no heat in his voice, no anger, just tired, near-apathetic honesty. “I pulled Marinette out of you.” 

Dean stares at his brother, says, “You didn’t look like that when you did it the last time, you and the others. ‘Course, you _did_ end up half-dead,” he adds, thoughtful.

Sam doesn’t say anything, just picks up his shirt from where Dean had thrown it, not even a wince on his face even though Dean _knows_ how much that had to hurt. 

“Sam, talk to me,” Dean says, practically orders. 

“I had help last time,” Sam says, just when Dean’s about ready to press the issue. “The power of the trinity spread out over three people. And Petro loa ride rougher.” He looks at Dean, mocking, self-deprecating smile at the edges of his lips and adds, “There’s a price for everything.” 

Dean stares at his brother, doesn’t understand what’s going on here, and just when Dean’s about to admit defeat, a car comes barrelling down the road, turns into the parking lot, kicking up a cloud of dust in its wake. Two people get out of the back doors, and as they run towards Sam, Dean recognises Sophie and Théo, feels his heart stop. 

They stop a few feet away, and Théo looks at Sam for a moment, eyes shining, before he falls to one knee, Sophie doing the same a second later. “_Poto mitan_,” Théo murmurs, and Dean thinks he almost hears fear in the words. “We heard the _hountogi_, went to Louisiana, but you’d left already. We got here as soon as we could.” 

Dean looks back, sees Pierre leaning against the car, and figures he’s not needed, not when Sophie and Théo are there, can’t tear their eyes from Sam. 

Pierre smiles at Dean, who goes into his motel room and slams the door. 

\--

There’s a knock on the door not five minutes later, and Dean says, “Go away, Sam.” 

The door opens, and Kate’s standing there, hands on her hips. “You’re fucking ridiculous, you know that, right?” she says, and Dean can’t look at her. “Fucking get the fuck up, you fucking _fuck_,” she growls. 

Dean lifts his head up in surprise, because that was pretty intimidating for a five-foot tall slip of a girl, and before he knows it, she’s dragging him to stand in the doorway. Dean sees Sam in the parking lot, still standing there, and he looks away, but Kate prods him, tells him to look again. Dean does, and he raises an eyebrow, because Sophie and Théo are still on their knees and Sam’s talking to them but not the way, Dean thinks, he would if he was about to fuck them. 

“What’s going on?” he asks in a whisper, because Kate has to know something more than he does, even if she’s not a vodouisante. 

“He’s giving them orders,” Pierre says, startling Dean. 

Dean looks, sees Pierre leaning against the front wall of the motel, arms crossed, one foot propped up against the faded siding, sweat drops blooming on his forehead. 

“He’s what?” Dean asks, looking back at Kate. 

She shakes her head as if to say that she doesn’t know either, and Pierre says, “What he did, to get Marinette out of you. He made himself his own trinity out of Petro loa. Danny for Freda, Karrefour for Ati, and Ti-Jean’s black magic ‘stead of Lakwa’s death magic.” 

He pauses, more, it seems, because he’s having trouble with the words, with the mere idea of this, than for dramatic effect, and goes on, says, “Things like that, they don’t always work, Dean. They hardly ever work. But when they do, they. They change things. Change people.”

“Why aren’t they fucking already?” Dean asks, still can’t get the volume of his voice above a whisper. 

“The Sam that loved them is dead,” Pierre says, blunt. “The trinity they formed, Freda, Lakwa, Ogou, balance of Rada and Petro, it’s dissolved. They came for orders, not for fucking. He’s lost everything he had, except for respect and fear, and no vodouisante will ever touch him again, not as he’s a trinity belonging to the Petro now.”

Dean blinks, shivers in the heat, and looks at Kate. 

She shrugs, says, “Keeps things too fucking close.” 

“You’re an empath,” Dean says, starting to get frustrated now, because all of this, it’s too much for him, way over his head, which is still aching, hasn’t gotten any better. “Can’t you tell what he’s feeling?”

Kate laughs, and Sophie looks over at the noise, glares before turning her attention back to Sam. “I haven’t said a thing about anyone’s fucking feelings, Dean,” she grins. “Sam fucking blocked it off for me a while back. Helps to have a friend who has his fucking vodou tricks, y’know? I haven’t felt anyone else’s fucking emotions since the night I went batshit in-fucking-sane.”

“It should be obvious how he’s feeling, though,” Pierre murmurs, right in Dean’s ear, “to you.” Dean turns, flabbergasted, and watches as Pierre smiles at him like a cat might before it pounces. “Take care of him, Dean. For all that no one will want to touch him, everyone will kill for him if he’s unhappy.” 

Pierre pushes himself off of the wall, saunters back to the car. Dean stands there, Kate at his side, and watches as Sophie and Théo stand up, bow awkwardly to Sam, and then walk back to the car, get inside. Pierre stands outside one moment longer, tilts his head to Sam, gives Dean a blinding smile, then slips back behind the wheel and drives away. 

Kate takes Dean by the arm, pulls him out to Sam, and then, with both of them looking at her, says, brightly, “I’m gonna take a fucking shower,” before hightailing out of the parking lot, slamming a door behind her when she runs into a room. 

Dean looks at Sam, looks at the marks all over Sam’s body, and says, without thinking, “You were seriously gonna die, just so I wouldn’t have a loa in me any more?” 

Sam eyes Dean, eyes the distance back to the motel, and sighs, shoulders drooping the slightest bit. It doesn’t look like he’s ashamed, though, more like he’s getting ready to fight, tensing to defend himself from fists or words, and something in Dean is almost hurt by the action. 

“I wasn’t planning on dying,” Sam says, “and Marinette needed to be bound. I did what I had to do.” 

Dean can’t stop himself, slaps Sam right across the face. He stares, shocked, at Sam’s turned head, like he can’t believe that he’s done that to his little brother. Dean’s hand is still raised, frozen in horror, and he lets it drop, steps forward, says, “Sam, I.” 

Sam turns back, looks at Dean, and the sheer, utter rage in Sam’s eyes makes Dean stop mid-step, the bared teeth and clawed hands make him freeze, heart skipping a beat. Sam breathes deep, reaches up, gingerly touches his cheekbone, then lets his hands trail higher, to the cut stitched up above his eye. When he pulls his hand away, Dean sees blood on Sam’s fingertips, and he starts to shake his head. 

“Sam, I’m sorry, come on, let’s take care of that,” and without thinking, he reaches out for Sam, to take his brother by the arm, by the shoulder, and get Sam inside, get him stitched up. 

Instead of letting him, Sam leans away from Dean’s touch, and says, “I’ll be fine,” voice blank, eyes fragmenting into loa, swirling and shimmering, before they settle again, back to Sam’s eyes, cold, hard as ice. “I need to pack some things up. Lissa’s coming to get me,” Sam goes on to say, and Dean’s feeling sick to his stomach, starting to panic. “She’ll be here soon and she won’t want to stay longer than she absolutely has to.” 

“What? No. Sam, no,” Dean says, shaking his head. “No. You’re not. We’re sticking together, Sam, you, me, and Kate. You can’t just go. You can’t leave.” 

“Take Kate home,” Sam says, ignoring Dean, walking around Dean towards the Impala. “Or put her on a bus, either way.” 

Dean’s still shaking his head but now he’s moving, going after Sam. Sam’s opening the Impala’s trunk, is closing up his duffel, rummaging through the weapons underneath, searching for something. “Sam, you’re being an idiot. Look, calm down and tell me what the hell you’re thinking, all right? This is crazy!” He ignores the feeling of power floating outwards from Sam, ignores the way it makes the hair on the back of his neck stand up, and says, “I’m not letting you go.” 

Sam picks up a set of knives, small ones, and the duffel before he closes the trunk. He looks at Dean, square in the eyes, and says, “You can’t stop me. You couldn’t before and you can’t now, Dean.”

That hurts, probably more than it should, but Dean’s still shaking his head when he hears a car coming down the road towards them, is still shaking his head when Lissa pulls a dust-covered El Camino into the parking lot, is still shaking his head when Sam moves. 

“Sam, come on,” Dean begs, but Sam doesn’t stop. “_Come on_.” 

Sam throws his things in the back seat, slides into the front seat, and disappears in a cloud of dust without looking back.


	9. Chapter 9

Dean drives Kate back to Belle Rose; he can’t think of anything else to do and she needs to get home. In the back of his mind, he knows he’s doing this because it was the last thing Sam asked of him, but he pushes that thought away. He likes Kate, they’ve gotten to know each other after living on the road together for two weeks with nothing but each other for company—them and Sam, though neither of them mention him. 

The first night back, Dean stays at her apartment, and she wakes him up halfway through the night, sobbing, hair flying every which way. He sits up on the couch, holds out his arms, and she crawls into his lap, soaks his t-shirt with her tears. Neither of them go back to sleep. 

The second night’s better, but it’s too quiet, the couch is too small, he feels like he’s trapped in a nightmare he can’t get out of. Dean ends up getting in the Impala and driving to the Mississippi, sitting on the bank and watching boats leave for the Gulf as the sun’s waking up. It’s hot and he’s not dressed for the weather, sweat gliding down his back like water, the same as if he’d jumped in the river, held his breath and ducked his head under. 

He goes back to Kate’s house, walks in and sees her sitting at the table, staring at a carton of rainbow sherbet. 

“I’m gonna get going,” he says, and Dean knows she’s hearing what he’s not saying, that it’s too strange being here without Sam, that he can’t stay, that he has to go find his brother, can’t sit here and just take Sam leaving without a fight, not this time. 

“What’re you gonna fucking do?” Kate asks, looking up at him with her red-rimmed and bloodshot eyes. _How are you going to find him?_

Dean shrugs, turns a chair around and straddles it, reaches over and takes the lid off of the carton, runs his finger through the quickly melting mess. “Dunno,” he says, licking off lime and lemon flavouring, leaving his skin sticky. “I’ll start with Lissa and go from there.” 

Kate tries to smile, but it’s not a pretty expression, doesn’t work. “Good fucking luck,” she mutters. 

\--

Lissa doesn’t tell him a thing. Not about Sam, at any rate; he can’t step on to her porch, he starts yelling, and she finally yanks open the door and stands there yelling back at him, hands on her hips, something in French Dean can’t understand and is pretty sure he wouldn’t want to anyway. 

“Just tell me where to find him,” he asks, getting desperate, and when she smiles, he says, “No, come on.” 

She doesn’t listen, just says, “_Va te faire foutre_!” and slams the door hard enough for Dean to feel the ground under him shake. 

“Fucking bitch,” he mutters under his breath as he’s stomping back to the car. 

“I heard that, you _trou duc’_!” Lissa screams from inside the house, and as the grass around Dean starts hissing, he remembers that it’s never a good thing to insult a hoodoo witch. He runs to the car, peals out of the street, and sees snakes slithering across the road behind him in his rear-view mirror. 

\--

Over the next four weeks, Dean crosses the country five times, picking up jobs when he stumbles across them, hustling every chance he can get, calling in every favour he’s owed by everyone he’s ever helped in order to find his brother. Sam’s gone to ground like a fucking guerrilla; either people have seen him everywhere at the same time or he’s nowhere at all, worse than a ghost.

Others, as soon as they realise they’re getting close to the edges of something related to vodou, back away quicker than a werewolf from silver shot, like they’d be willing to take on a demon but the vodou’s got everyone terrified, unwilling to mess with it. 

Dean half-expects that from the civilians, but then he calls Bobby and asks for help, and as soon as Dean mentions Kirklin, Bobby says he can’t do anything, sounds skittish, worried. Dean wouldn’t have expected that from hunters, but something’s apparently got a bunch of them spooked, something that wasn’t there a month and a half ago, and Dean’s left scrambling to try and figure out what Sam’s done. 

He drives into Bobby’s parking lot early one morning, sees the older hunter out in the junkyard with his latest dog, and Bobby’s shaking his head as soon as Dean steps out of the Impala. 

“You know I like you, Dean, but you better leave,” Bobby says, one hand tight around the handle of a coffee cup, the other holding a loaded shotgun. “Turn around and go on, now.” 

“The fuck’s wrong with everyone?” Dean asks, words bursting out of him. “Come on, Bobby, at least tell me why you won’t help me.” 

Bobby looks at Dean, half-surprised, and says, “You haven’t heard?” When Dean shakes his head, Bobby lets out a deep breath, looks around, and says, “You better come inside, then.” 

\--

Dean sits down at the old kitchen table, ass thumping into a hard seat with no cushion, fingertips tracing out grooves on the table he carved there himself twenty-some years ago. Bobby slips a cup of coffee under Dean’s nose, and Dean looks up, nods his thanks before taking a sip. The liquid’s hot, strong, bitter, and it reminds him of Sam, the way his brother smells. Dean grimaces, the coffee churns in his esophagus, and he puts the cup down, pushes it away and rubs his eyes. 

“What’s going on, Bobby?” he asks. “I’ve been trying to track Sam down for four weeks and everyone’s too scared to tell me anything.” 

“There’s lots of talk out there,” Bobby says, lowering himself into the chair across the table from Dean. It doesn’t escape Dean’s attention that Bobby’s watching him, that the shotgun’s resting lightly across Bobby’s legs. “People aren’t sure what to think. Between Walker getting himself lost, killed, we think, and your brother disappearing, seems like something might’ve gone wrong with the demon hunting. Few people say its curses to talk to a Winchester, now more than ever before.” 

Dean shakes his head, says, “They’re idiots and you know better. What else are they saying?” 

Bobby hesitates, but Dean widens his eyes, silently asking, and Bobby says, “There’s talk of some vodou going on down south. Something big that no one knows everything about, but there was power, and a lot of it. And then you come out of Louisiana, asking about your brother, calling in favours all over the place, and someone mentions you had a charm with something on it, said they heard that from Gordon Walker, who’s gone missing.” 

Dean swallows, doesn’t know what Bobby would do if he saw the two charms hanging next to Dean’s amulet, still around Dean’s neck. He resists the urge to make sure the charms are under his shirt, covered up, but he sees Bobby’s eyes flick downwards anyway, knows that Bobby can tell it’s not just an amulet hanging off the cord anymore.

“Now, hunters might be better at killing things, Dean, but we ain’t stupid,” Bobby says, going on, eyes meeting Dean’s again. “Vodouisantes all over the country acting jumpy, like there was a major power play inside the faith, no one knows what’s going on and you come waltzing out wearing vodou magic. Either you’re in it up to your eyeballs or Sam is, but talking to either of you about anything, even each other, might draw _us_ into it, and we’ll be damned before we see that happen.” 

Dean sits there, takes that all in, then nods, stands up. “Thanks for the info,” he says, knows he’s being gruff but he’s about ready to kill someone, himself, Sam, even resurrect Gordon and kill him again, for being so stupid, so arrogant, so foolish and stubborn and _Winchester_. Of _course_ hunters would start getting suspicious, isn’t that why Sam fled California in the first place? And here he’s been, just making it worse, running around like an idiot, drawing attention to them both.

“Dean, you know I’d do anything for your family,” Bobby goes on after a minute, shifting in his chair, looking uncomfortable. “Hell, I helped John raise you and Sam. But this, I’m not a guy people come to for help with vodou. I respect it, I don’t mess with it, and you better not be either, you understand what I’m trying to tell you?” 

Dean nods, says, “Yeah, I know what you’re saying,” sits there a moment longer before getting up, saying, “Thanks for the coffee. And the info.” 

He stalks out of Bobby’s like a man possessed, except he’s not, thanks to his idiot of a brother, the same idiot who’s out there all by himself, prey for any hunter who thinks that taking a shot at a Winchester about now might be a good idea, and all of this has Dean pretty fucking pissed off. 

Dean waves off whatever Bobby’s saying, mind too full of how he’s supposed to track down his brother, and drives away, heading for a liquor store.

\--

Dean buys two bottles of rum, dark as molasses and thick like honey. The guy behind the counter gives him an odd look when Dean adds a pack of playing cards to the bill, but doesn’t say anything, rings Dean’s purchases up and sends him on his way. After another stop, at a tobacco store, Dean checks into a motel, goes online and searches out a pattern, and then sleeps for a couple hours. 

Once it’s dark, he finds the nearest cemetery and lugs the tobacco, cards, and rum out to the middle of the grounds, keeping an eye out for other people but not seeing anyone. He’s twitchy, doesn’t like this one bit, but he needs help and the loa liked him, argued with him and chastised him, but liked him, Dean thinks, and if anyone, anything, would know where Sam is, Baron La Croix would. 

Dean sets up a small altar out of rocks in the middle of the cemetery, opening both bottles of rum, pouring half of one over the rocks and the ground around the makeshift altar before setting the bottles behind the rocks, taking out the cards and laying the ace of spades on top of the altar, opening the pouch of tobacco and placing that next to the card. 

This whole thing, the altar, the place, the reason for calling Baron La Croix, it’s not traditional, definitely not smart, he’s not even calling Legba first to open the way, but Dean uses a piece of chalk to trace out the baron’s vévé on the grass and then steps back, takes a deep breath. 

“Lakwa, get your ass out here,” Dean says, words echoing in the darkness, bouncing off of headstones, around trees and through plastic flowers, heavy with the air of mourning that lurks around the gravesite. Dean shudders, says, “Come on, you damn loa, get out here and talk to me. I need to find my brother.” 

One of the bottles of rum, the half-full bottle, cracks, shatters like someone’s thrown a rock at it, startling Dean. The rum drips over the ace of spades, over the tobacco, and then Dean smells smoke, like someone’s just lit up a cigar. The two smells collide in the air, thick rum and thicker smoke, and surround him until Dean’s coughing, eyes watering. He drops to one knee outside of the vévé, loses his balance as fumes practically blind him, and one hand touches the chalk outline. 

A barrage of images zoom across Dean’s vision, too fast for him to make out, lots of red and black, some yellow, and he ends up shaking his head, thinking that this isn’t helping, doesn’t make any sense. Like Lakwa heard him, the images slow, start cycling at a slower rate, and Dean watches, tries to memorise everything. 

A huge spreading oak covered in Spanish moss, next to a lake. A cavern in the middle of the mountains, with a fire blazing at the centre. A shop selling weapons, knives, custom-made. Someone bowing, someone else calling down curses, someone else dying, throat slit and choking as the light in their eyes fades. 

Dean doesn’t understand, doesn’t get whatever the baron’s trying to show him, and he can almost _feel_ the loa’s frustration when he says, “Come on, I need more than that. This is fucking ridiculous. Just, I don’t care, damn it. Just ride me if you have to,” and it’s like that’s a talisman, a magical invocation. 

“Poto mitan _done gone and blocked you up but good, boy,_” Lakwa says. “_Ain’t seen nothing tighter than your head since I be fucking my way into a virgin’s cunt._” 

“That’s an image I was fine living without,” Dean drawls, relieved and panicked at the same time. He’ll get some answers now, now that he can talk to the baron, but he remembered what happened the last time he was ridden, some of it, and the thought of another loa in his head terrifies him.

Lakwa must hear that or sense it, because he moves in the back of Dean’s head and says, gruff, “_I ain’t nothing like her, boy, so just you relax. Your body’s your own, I ain’t taking it over. Couldn’t if I be wanting to, not with the charms your brother be laying on your head. Only way in’s if you ask, and nothing more than talking even after. So you sit back, ‘cause I just be here to talk about the _poto mitan_, since you be asking so nicely. What you wanna know?_”

Dean shifts, doesn’t take his hand off the vévé, and says, finding this one of the surrealist things he’s ever done before, “I need to find Sam. He took off after that thing down in Kirklin and he’s impossible to track down. I thought you’d be able to help.” 

“_Heya, I can help,_” Lakwa says. “_Just you answer me one question, Dean Winchester. After it be happening, he take any drugs? When the other _chwal_ come for their orders, he take anything?_”

Dean frowns, thinks back, finally says, “I don’t think so. I don’t know. Why?” The weirdest sensation comes over Dean, like his stomach and throat are changing places but not because of him. Lakwa’s upset, almost sickened, and Dean doesn’t understand why. “He needs the drugs when none of you are,” he says, puzzling things out, but stops, because if Sam’s not taking drugs and the baron’s not there, “He’s always got one of you with him now. Whatever he did, he’ll never be able to get rid of you all.” 

He feels the baron’s agreement, sadness and horror, and understands when the baron says, “_He ain’t never got one of the Rada or guédé vévé on him. Symbols, ayah, bones for me, hearts for ‘Zulie, snakes for Damballah, some of them curling lines for Ati, hard-to-pin-down bastard, but no vévé._” 

“He’s got Petro vévé, though,” Dean whispers, starting to understand why Baron La Croix’s worried. “Black magic Petro. He’s, what, he’s _bound_ himself to them? Not just to save me, but for good?” 

“_Them and Danny, mebbe, she always had a soft spot for ‘im,_” Lakwa says after a moment. “_But that ain’t good, boy. All Petro bindings, and making himself a Petro trinity, and the vévés drawn on his skin, that ain’t good. You gotta find him, and fast._”

Dean swallows, licks his lips, and asks, “Why? What’s so important about this, why now and not before?” 

Lakwa’s restless, feels reluctant as he moves in the back of Dean’s skull, and after Dean pushes a little, the loa says, “_Petro loa, they be fighters. They be warriors. Karrefour and Ti-Jean, they mix magic when they kill, violent and blood-crazed._”

It’s not an answer, is by no means at _all_ an answer, but Dean says, “Being bound to them, having them there, all the time, it’s going to drive him crazy, isn’t it?” 

“_You find him, and you do what you gotta do, boy,_” the baron says. “_You keep him with you and keep him grounded, you hear me? A’cause if the other _chwal_ ever think he be losing it, if they think he be pulling a Marinette-horse, they’ll be killing him like he be tying her up. No matter how much they be respecting him, they ain’t gonna let a Petro-bound run buckaloose. You hear ol’ Lakwa?_”

Dean pulls his hand from the vévé, feels Lakwa sliding out of his head, leaving an address in his mind on the way out, and he stands up, brushing his knees. “Yes, sir,” he mutters, picking up the full bottle of rum and heading for the Impala, leaving the cards and tobacco for the baron, scattering the chalk vévé with his heel of his boot on his way out. “Yes, sir, I hear you.” 

The rum gets thrown in the backseat, starts rolling on the floor as Dean drives out of the cemetery and heads in the direction of Savannah, Georgia. 

\--

The windows are down when Dean rolls into the city and the air’s heavy, clinging to Dean’s skin like a second set of clothes, his first dripping with sweat and getting wetter with every second he’s stopped at a light, looking around. He remembers coming here back with John a couple years ago, when Sam was in California, when they thought Sam was at school and on his way to being something normal, something average and everyday. 

It had been a plantation home just outside the city then, haunted by the ghosts of some slaves and the slave-owner who killed them; the man had been a son of a bitch, terrorising people even after his death, and Dean hadn’t felt at all bad about setting the bastard on fire when they dug up his bones. 

Now, though, coming into the city with one thing on his mind, it feels different, feels larger, somehow, and smaller at the same time. Old town in the south, it would normally make his skin crawl, just as much from the living as the dead; people who build up tours around the supernatural, who live with it day and night, it changes something about a person, changes the way they view things, like their eyes see farther, like their bones go back longer. 

Dean doesn’t like it, never has, and Sam knows it, Sam who’s never felt that way, who’s apparently had vévés in his head since birth, and now that part of it, why he liked the south when Dean and John hated it, why he seemed to fit in down here when the other two never did, makes more sense. Dean doesn’t like it, but he accepts it, and when the light changes, he turns left. 

The place he’s heading for, the address Baron La Croix gave him, is in the poorer section, cheap and probably has a leaking roof, Dean thinks, but he stops and looks at a map, raises an eyebrow when he sees the street right downtown. When he pulls up in front of a row of townhomes, he raises both eyebrows, because these places can’t be at all affordable. 

Still, this is where Lakwa said Sam was, so Dean parks and walks up the door with the address the baron gave him, and picks the lock. Dean pushes the door open, steps inside, and closes the door behind him. He’s in a small foyer, just a little space, tiled before the carpet begins, and he’s looking around, not watching where he’s stepping, when he gets stopped, can’t put his foot down onto the carpet. Dean looks down, doesn’t see anything, but there’s a five-spot painted into the waist-high wallpaper on his left and a five-spot rug on the right. 

“Well, _fuck_,” he mutters, then shakes his head and decides he apparently doesn’t have a choice whether or not to announce his presence. “Sam?” he calls out, lush furniture and wall-hangings soaking up the echo of his voice. “_Sam?_ Get your ass down here!” 

Footsteps, coming from the right, so Dean leans as far as he can to the left, peering around the corner to where he thinks the staircase is. It’s dark over there, no lights, but the footsteps keep coming, so Dean moves backwards, puts his back to the wall, and draws a gun. 

Floorboards creak, then Sam’s standing in front of him, on that carpet, arms crossed and a lazy, sensual smile dripping from his lips. “Ayizan, Dean Winchester in the flesh,” he says, the sound of his voice matching his smile, somewhere between a drawl and a croon. The sound, rather than calming Dean, makes him shiver, makes warning bells go off in his head, and he looks at Sam’s eyes, doesn’t see his brother. 

“Which one are you?” Dean asks, carefully, because he’s already met Erzulie Dantor, and he’s not keen on annoying either of the other two. 

“I’m Karrefour, boy, and you owe me your sanity, so don’t go getting smart on me, y’hear?” Karrefour says, but then Sam’s eyes are shifting, breaking apart and refocusing, and it’s Sam, but with a hint of something else, something Dean hopes isn’t madness, because if the price of his rescue from Marinette was Sam’s sanity, that was too high and he’ll take it all back, take _her_ back. 

“Dean,” Sam says, and he sounds almost puzzled, sounds tired. “How’d you find me?” 

Dean doesn’t answer, just looks down at the edge where tile meets carpet and then looks up, gives Sam a pointed look. 

Sam looks confused, but then his expression clears and he waves a hand. “Come on in. I’ll. You want some tea? Something to drink?” he asks, and heads away, back around the corner, before Dean says anything. 

Dean frowns, lifts his foot and steps onto the carpet, gives the five-spots a glare before following the sound of his brother, walking through a townhouse that feels more like a show home than a place where his brother lives. He gets to the kitchen and leans against the wall, watches as Sam glides around, pouring two glasses of sweet tea and taking out beignets from a Tupperware container, expression blank. Sam doesn’t seem overly aggressive, doesn’t seem like he’s about ready to go on this mass magical killing spree that the baron hinted at, which leaves Dean back at square one, trying to figure out what’s going on. 

“Why’d you run here?” he asks, once Sam’s gestured at the table and put a glass of tea and a plate of beignets in front of Dean’s chair. Dean sits down, hoping that Sam will tell Dean why he ran and not necessarily why he ran _here_, and picks up a beignet, bites into it and lets sugar cling to the sweat on his upper lip.

Sam sits on the counter, feet barely skimming across the floor, sipping his tea and looking, for all that he’s practically a giant, like a child. “Own this place,” Sam says, shrugging. “Have for a year. I come here when I want to relax,” and he looks puzzled for a moment, like he did at the door, before something wipes the look off of his face and leaves him, not smiling, but more peaceful than he was a second before. “I put a down payment on it with some of the earnings from the café, have a decent enough mortgage.” 

Dean gives Sam a crooked look before he parrots back, “Earnings from the café. Why would you get earnings from the café?” 

Sam laughs, says, “Because I own it, Dean,” like Dean should have known that. “The one in San Francisco, a few places down around New Orleans and Baton Rouge, some in Mississippi,” and his face dips again, but only for a split-second, almost impossible to see. 

Dean doesn’t like it, these changes in his brother, so he asks, “Can I speak to Danny, Sam?” and watches as Sam’s eyes shift, circle and cycle, break apart and come together, quicker than he could blink. 

“You came back, child,” Erzulie says, and Dean’s almost worried about his own sanity, being able to tell the loa apart even when they’re all using his brother as their horse. “Just when I ain’t in the mood for talking, o’course. Want another fuck? Can’t say I’d mind, mm, not when your cock’s the one inside, can see why the boy wants it so much.” 

Dean ignores that, the way that the casual offer makes his fingers itch to dig themselves in Sam’s skin, the way all the blood in his body has gone south and made him instantly, ashamedly hard, and asks, “What’re you doing to my brother?” 

Erzulie frowns, dips her head, but even that action, bangs slipping over her face, can’t stop the way Dean’s body is heating up. 

“We protecting him, child, keeping him safe. He don’t wanna think about things, we ain’t gonna make him, y’catch me?” she eventually says, looking at Dean through her eyelashes, soot-darkened and thick. 

“You’ve been clouding his mind?” Dean asks, nearly in a whisper, because that’s too much to think of, too much to consider, that without him, Sam would rather let the loa have control, would rather not remember the past few weeks, the past couple months. “Why?”

“My _chwal_’s in pain, Dean,” Erzulie says, running a hand down her side and hip, as if she’s smoothing out a dress. “I’d do anything for him, anything to lessen the ache, and so would the others. People, other loa, they ain’t never thought much of us Petro, but we take care of our own.” 

Dean can’t breathe, can only sit there and hold a half-eaten beignet, looking blankly at Erzulie Dantor riding his brother. 

Erzulie sighs, rolls her eyes and stands up, runs both hands down the front of Sam’s jeans, smoothing out wrinkles in the denim. “Ayah, you don’t think much of us either, but my _chwal_, it’s been hard for ‘im.” She coughs, clears her throat and tilts her head, looks at Dean, frowning suddenly. “How’d you find us, anyways? Ain’t nobody know where we are, not even the old trinity. My _chwal_ never told nobody ‘bout this place.” 

Dean freezes, looks at her and then looks away, biting on his lower lip for a moment before muttering something, random noises, he thinks. Erzulie snaps at him, tells him to speak up, and for a split second, Dean hears violence in his brother’s voice, violence and a bloodlust that sets his spine tingling. 

“I talked to Baron La Croix,” he says. 

There’s a struggle in Erzulie’s eyes, like someone else is fighting her control of Sam’s body, and the next voice that comes from Sam’s mouth is thick like honey, spilling magic like water over Dean’s skin. 

“I made sure that barrier was tight, boy,” someone says, Dean’s guessing Ti-Jean, and Dean feels phantom fingers ghosting over his head, nails scratching at his skull, calluses weaving their way through his hair. “Only way to break it, you gotta ask someone in. You do that?” 

“Yes, sir,” Dean says, responding to Ti-Jean, the feeling of his power reminding him of Lakwa’s, the same source, different uses. He holds back a shudder, sees black amusement in the depths of Ti-Jean’s eyes. “I needed to find Sam,” and he stops. 

Sam’s eyes, the loa in them, cycle through, as Sam’s body moves toward him. They’re acting in concert, the trinity, and Dean’s beginning to see why it’s so terrifying for that much power to be concentrated in one vessel, why even the mention of a trinity is enough to have the vodouisantes scared and fiercely protective at the same time, how splitting apart from something like that, spread out over three people, might have been enough to drive a lesser man than Sam insane. 

As it stands, though, Dean’s not sure Sam escaped. 

Erzulie takes a step, hips swinging, smile on her face predatory and yet inviting, like she’d be a firecracker in bed, and Dean can’t take his eyes off of her. She swirls into Karrefour, and his look is vicious without Erzulie’s warm edge of sexuality, cold and calculating as he narrows his eyes and gives Dean a lazy smile. Dean’s frozen in place, doesn’t know if it’s a spell or if his muscles just aren’t responding, but when Ti-Jean takes the last step toward him, walking as if he might have a limp in another body, in another place, Dean swallows. 

Ti-Jean reaches out a hand, smoothes his thumb over the bridge of Dean’s nose. “You want him back, full and whole?” he asks, words soft, almost inaudible. “You found him, boy. What you gonna do with him now? Now you know what he has in him, know you now what we be doing for our horse, what you gonna do with him?” 

Dean searches for words, for something that can convince these loa that he needs his brother back more than he’s needed anything before, that he’s not going anywhere and he’ll be damned before he lets Sam run away again, not without a fight, not the way he’s let Sam go every time before. 

“Whatever he needs,” Dean finally says, and Ti-Jean leaves Sam’s eyes. Dean can see the three loa there, circling, chunks of ice in a raging whirlpool, and he’s starting to panic, because he doesn’t know what they’re deciding, whether or not they believe him. 

“Please,” he whispers, reaching out and moving bangs out of eyes, letting his fingertips graze across a forehead and down a solid cheekbone, sweeping across a strong jaw line and down the planes of a neck he wants to bury his teeth in. “I want my brother back.” 

Sam’s eyes close, and all of his muscles loosen before they tense, and Sam shakes. Dean steps forward without thinking, wraps his arms around Sam, and says, “No chick-flick moments, okay? You need to sit down?” 

“Why’d you follow me?” Sam asks, and even though Dean’s sure it’s his brother asking, he can still hear the others, still hear the trinity riding him. 

“Because you’re my brother,” Dean says, “and I wanted to,” simple as that. 

Sam chokes, catches a sob, maybe a laugh, in the back of his throat, and when he speaks, it’s _Sam_, not one of the loa, not the _poto mitan_, not the distant man Dean’s coming to think is more like John than Dean is, even with the hunting. 

“You are such an idiot,” Sam says, and Dean reaches up, smacks the back of Sam’s head without letting go. Sam clings back, feels wrung out and worn out in Dean’s hold, an impression that only solidifies when Sam adds, “When’s the last time you slept?” because it doesn’t sound so much a question as the utterance of a desperate need. 

“Too long ago,” Dean replies immediately, and lets go, takes Sam by the hand and entwines his fingers in Sam’s, clenching tightly. “Please tell me you have a bed big enough for both of us somewhere in this place,” he says, ignoring the way Sam freezes at the question. 

“Dean,” Sam says.

Dean turns around, glares at his brother, and hisses, “We are _not_ doing this, Sam. Mother _fuck_. I’ve been chasing you around for a goddamned month, we have hunters and crazy vodou people on our tracks, the whole fucking world knows _something_ happened in Mississippi even when I _don’t_, and I’m tired. I’m tired, you’re tired, so we’re going to go sleep, and when we wake up, I am going to fuck you so hard you won’t be able to walk for a week and you’ll be a cranky little bitch about it, but if that’s the only way I can make sure you won’t run off on me, you better be damn sure I’m gonna do it. Understand?”

Sam’s grinning, a little, high spots of colour in his cheeks, and he doesn’t at all sound serious when he says, “A cranky little bitch, huh?” and leads Dean upstairs to the bedroom, to a king size bed. 

Dean undresses them both quickly; though his eyes linger on Sam’s tattoos, on Sam’s hipbones and cock, his fingers are deft and nearly professional as he propels Sam to the bed. Dean doesn’t get in on the other side until Sam’s settled, and the second Dean lays down, Sam curls around him, tangles his legs in with Dean’s, throws one arm over Dean’s stomach. 

“Get some rest, you crazy voodoo king,” Dean mutters, and Sam snorts in amusement before they both fall asleep in the middle of a Savannah afternoon, sounds of traffic and the smell of jasmine blowing in the open window.


	10. Chapter 10

Dean wakes up to the slow sense of someone touching his neck. He lies there for a minute, trying to remember what’s going on, but then the finger strokes one of the charms and he knows its Sam just from the action, deliberate and yet restrained, as if Sam’s cataloguing texture and sensation for future reference. 

Dean’s not excited about that, because it makes him feel like Sam’s doing this to leave again, like his brother’s taking the opportunity to make one more memory, to answer one more internal question, before skipping town, so he reaches up, grips Sam’s wrist tightly. 

“What are you doing?” he asks, voice ragged with sleep, and as Dean opens his eyes, he sees that it’s dark, that they’ve been sleeping at least six hours, maybe more. 

“Wondering why you’re still wearing the charm to help you understand Creole,” Sam replies, and from the sound of his voice, he hasn’t been awake long either. “It should’ve worn off by now.”

That makes Dean feel a little better, especially when he says, “Maybe I just like it,” and Sam snort-laughs, shakes his head a bit, sends curls flying every which way. “Say something in Creole, then,” Dean suggests. “We’ll see if it has. I didn’t notice.” 

Sam shrugs a little, slides his hand out of Dean’s hold, and sits up, cross-legged, looking down at Dean. “Why did you come back?” he says, but Dean’s watching Sam’s mouth, doesn’t see lips matching up with sound. 

“Well, it still works,” Dean mutters, before he reaches up again, pulls Sam back down and holds Sam to his side, nestled there, until Sam relaxes, starts drawing little circles around Dean’s belly-button. 

“You gonna answer the question?” Sam asks, and even though it’s Sam, Dean hears strains of the south in his brother’s voice, echoes of heat and swamps, depths of bayou and lake, sun-drenched and sweat-shimmering. 

He’s not sure what to say, whether to say that Sam’s his brother, of course he’d be back, or about what John said, that Dean needs to protect his brother, or what Lakwa said about grounding Sam before he turns Petro and goes homicidal, or _what_, because everything he can think of makes it sound like he’s doing this because someone else told him to or because he’s worried, doesn’t trust Sam’s judgment. 

Finally, Sam still waiting and more patient than Dean ever would have given his brother credit for before he went to California, Dean says, “I can’t do this alone, Sam.” 

He’s not sure what he’s talking about, whether he means the job, or being here in the south, or even _living_, but when Sam says, just as quietly, “Yes, you can,” he knows Sam understands, gets instantly, like he never has before, that Sam has a fear of being rejected by his family just as much as Dean’s scared of them leaving him alone. 

“Yeah, well,” he says, tightening his grip on Sam for just a moment. “I don’t want to.” 

Sam’s quiet for a long time and Dean’s content to lay there and wait, listening to his brother breathing, hearing Sam’s heart beat. Sam finally says, “They won’t ever go, Dean. I’ve got their vévés in my head and on my skin, and I’ve bound myself to them, willingly. Can you accept that?” 

“I don’t think I have a choice,” Dean says wryly. He feels Sam start to pull away, not physically, but out of this quiet, open space they’ve created, and he goes on, says, “They aren’t that bad. Danny’s got a mouth on her the size of Texas, and the other two are downright terrifying, but I’ll get used to it. I wasn’t crazy about it, I’m still not, I probably won’t ever be, but one good thing’s come out of this.” 

He can almost _hear_ Sam frown, so when Sam asks him what the benefit is, Dean grins, leans up and looks down at Sam, gives his brother a smirk, and says, “Lean back, and I’ll show you.” 

Sam’s got a puzzled look on his face but he does as Dean says, and the gasp that comes out of his lips when Dean leans down and lets his tongue glide across one sweeping line of ink is one of the best noises Dean’s ever heard Sam make. 

“I’m going to lick every inch of every one of these tattoos,” Dean murmurs, letting his tongue flick out to taste another line of ink, this one small, pink, heart-shaped. “And you’re going to tell me what they all mean and when you got them, whether they hurt or not and where you were.” His teeth graze the next tattoo, black-outlined bone near one of Sam’s nipples. “If you stop, we’ll just have to start all over again.”

“I don’t think I’ll,” Sam starts to say, though his words break apart into a groan as Dean circles his tongue around Sam’s other nipple, tracing a curlicue, before sucking on the hard nub, biting down and pulling gently with his teeth, eyes watching the look on Sam’s face. 

Dean grins, leans back, and says, “You don’t think you’ll what, little brother?” 

Sam opens his eyes, glares at Dean, and says, “Story time later. Fuck now,” and yanks Dean, pulls him up, starts sucking on Dean’s lips, hips canting to rub his cock against Dean’s. “Come on, Dean,” he murmurs, biting on Dean’s lower lip, gliding his tongue across the nip a moment later, soothing out the sting. 

It’s never been easy to resist Sam’s puppy-dog eyes, but looking down, seeing the way Sam’s eyes looked back in St. Louis, dark and hot, Dean completely loses his ability to refuse. He likes the look in Sam’s eyes, the way _he_ put it there, wants to see how big Sam’s pupils can dilate, how Sam sounds when Dean’s buried deep inside him, whether Sam talks or screams or does nothing but pant when he’s being fucked. 

“Do you have,” Dean starts to ask, but he stops when Sam looks up at him and shakes his head. “A place to hide,” he sighs, leans up, away from his brother. He’s got lube and condoms out in the Impala but the thought of having to put on jeans, at the very least, and run out to get them doesn’t exactly help the mood. 

Sam’s fingers stroke down Dean’s chest, and Dean looks down at his brother, thoughtfully. 

“When Danny,” Sam says, and Dean tilts his head. “She didn’t lie,” Sam says, as if he’s worried Dean doesn’t believe him, is getting upset. “I’m clean. We all were, and we made sure we got tested every six weeks. I don’t,” he pauses, swallows, “I don’t know what access you’ve had to tests, but I. Dean, it doesn’t matter.”

“Yes, it does,” Dean says, but he leans back down, licks a stripe up Sam’s face, stubble burning against his tongue. “I’m clean, but I have things in the car.” 

Sam shudders against him, under him, and says, “We’ll get them later.” Dean moves down, starts sucking at the skin under Sam’s jaw, and he can feel Sam’s adam’s apple move when Sam adds, “Dean, come on, _please_.” 

The plea, almost begging, it’s enough to have Dean raise an eyebrow as well as his head, looking at his brother’s face, and he sees behind Sam’s mask, all of Sam’s barriers down like they haven’t been in years. His breath catches in his throat, seeing it, the way Sam’s face is filled with such desperate longing, such pained need, and Dean’s cock throbs, hard and leaking pre-come. 

“Fuck you so hard,” Dean mutters, crawling down Sam’s body and playing with thin, wiry hairs around the base of Sam’s dick. Sam arches, so Dean does it again, scratches his fingers the same way, and watches with a smirk as Sam groans, thigh muscles tensing. “Make you scream so loud, all those fancy neighbours of yours’ll be calling the cops.”

Sam laughs, high and shaky sound, and spreads his legs. “Bet you can’t,” he says.

Dean glances up, sees challenge under the need, lust under the desperation. Its better, but not what he wanted, not yet, so he shoots Sam a cocky grin and puts one finger in his mouth, starts sucking, cheeks hollowing. 

“Fuck,” Sam says, eyes fixated on Dean’s finger sliding in and out of Dean’s mouth. Sam smiles, licks his lips and moves his hips, one hand snaking down to lazily stroke at his dick. “Anytime,” he says, then, and arches up. 

\--

Sam’s a talker, pours words into Dean’s ears that don’t help Dean’s concentration, push Dean toward orgasm faster than he’s strictly comfortable with. He’s moving inside of his brother, fucking Sam deep and hard and slow, Sam’s heels pressing into Dean’s back, and it’s not perfect but it’s on its way there. 

Dean’s learning his brother in a whole new way, learning the keys to a new language of Sam, the groans and whimpers and growls, what he has to do to get Sam panting, to have Sam arch beneath him, to have Sam shift from lewd English into even filthier Creole. Sam’s moving, fucking himself on Dean just as much as Dean’s fucking him, not fighting but not laying there, either, somewhere in the middle, and as Dean slides out and then moves in again, Sam bends his spine and shudders, coming all over his stomach. 

Sam’s clenched around Dean’s cock as he rides out his orgasm, and Dean’s never been in someone so hot before, never had his dick gripped so tightly. It makes him groan, twist a little, and the next thrust is harder, deeper, like he’s trying to find out how to bury all of himself inside of Sam. 

“Come on, Dean,” Sam whispers, breath still ragged, riding the waves and valleys of aftershock. “Wanna feel you come in me, split me apart, come on, milk you _dry_.” 

Dean thrusts once, twice, five times, and then freezes, motions jerking to a halt as he spills inside of Sam.

\--

It’s hot and dirty and messy, but when Dean pulls out and Sam groans, when Dean lies down and Sam sighs, turns over and curls into him, unable to hide a vaguely surprised wince, it’s worth it. Dean reaches down on the floor, picks up his t-shirt and wipes off his dick, reaches over and wipes drying come off of Sam’s stomach, then tosses the shirt in the direction of the door, just so long as its not on or near the bed. 

They’re quiet, content to lie there for a long time, let silent minutes pass. Dean’s mind is whirling under a post-coital haze, trying to figure out how things have changed so much in two months, how they could move from him thinking of Sam as his brother to this, fucking his brother, his brother who also happens to be something near-sacred to the vodouisantes across the country. 

Dean thinks of the charms around his neck, pieces of tin that bounce against his amulet, and says, “The first charm you gave me, back in San Francisco,” feeling Sam’s lazy breathing hitch, “what did it do?”

Sam tilts his head, looks up at Dean with shuttered eyes, asks, “Why?”

“The demon said something about it,” Dean says, taken aback at the look in Sam’s eyes, the way it makes his brother look old, the way it shows hints of the loa circling in his mind. “He said something about children, about how your gift was the best, and that the charm, it was like you were there in my place.”

Dean feels Sam pulling away and holds his brother tighter, won’t let Sam leave. Sam fights the hold for a moment, like he actually believes Dean will let him go again, but Dean says, “No, Sam. I’m not letting you run off again, not without a fight. You can tell me anything.” 

Sam tenses, then his muscles shake as Sam forces them to relax. “The charm, it draws up memories of, of home. Safe places,” Sam says, and Dean wonders what Sam would think if he told his brother what he saw that first time, what he felt, holding the charm. 

“Using connections like that’s always been the best way to protect something, but I put some of myself in it as well, the gift I have. Pierre told you I have vévés drawn in my head,” Sam says after a moment, and his tone of voice makes Dean shiver. “It’s more than that. It’s like an open invitation to possession. The gift, it was blocked for a long time, maybe because of Mom, we’re not sure. When it started to open, that’s when I was in San Francisco, and the loa found me somehow and pushed me to the café.” 

Sam pauses, shifts a little, and then adds, “When the loa came in, that first night, they blocked off the opening and turned it into a vévé so that demons, spirits, things like that, can’t come in. If they aren’t there, it’s like my mind being open to everything, anything. It’s terrifying,” Sam says, and his voice sounds hollow, blank. 

Dean tightens his hold on Sam, gives him something physical to hold on to, and says, softly, “The Rohypnol blocks that off?” He tries not to sound judgmental, tries not to sound accusing or pissy, because he’s honestly curious, baffled as to how this works. 

“Yeah,” Sam murmurs. “Clouded my mind enough to make it feel like there was a loa inside, enough to make me forget that there wasn’t.”

“But you won’t need it anymore,” Dean says, pushing. “Since you’ve bound the Petro to yourself. Why didn’t you ever do that before?” 

Sam’s silent for long enough that Dean thinks his brother’s fallen asleep, maybe, or drifted off in to some quiet communication with the loa, and he’s about to ask, but then Sam says, “Because I always thought I’d find some way out of this.” He’s quiet, too quiet, sounds almost broken underneath the blank tone he’s using. “If I never bound myself to them, I always had the hope that I could leave, that I could go back to, to you and Dad, I guess, and no one would ever know.” 

Dean hadn’t been expecting that, and in his sad shock, he says, “You did it for me,” like he’s only just now _getting_ it, even though he knew that before, knew it but didn’t want to accept it, that it’s for _him_ that Sam’s given up every hope and dream of normality he ever had. 

Sam pulls away, slips out of Dean’s hold like soap, slick and sour, and before Dean can react, Sam’s out of the bedroom. Dean doesn’t wait, though, doesn’t even stop to think, gets up and follows Sam downstairs, through the living room to someplace in the back, laundry room with clothes everywhere, dirty ones piled near the dryer, clean ones folded, hanging up, the room reeking of detergent and fabric conditioner, hot humid air swirling the smell around through an open window. 

Sam’s putting clothes on when Dean fists his hands in Sam’s t-shirt, slams Sam against the wall, knocking Sam’s head back with an audible _thunk_.

“You did it for me,” Dean growls, before biting his way into Sam’s mouth. He fucks Sam’s mouth with his tongue, until Sam’s limp and pliant under him, arms wrapped around Dean’s neck. Dean pulls back, bumps his forehead against Sam’s, says, “I’m not letting you run away again, Sam. You’re stuck with me, okay? Dad told me to make sure I have your back, Lakwa told me not to leave you alone, and I don’t want to have to explain to either of them why I’m not here with you.” 

Sam sighs, thumps his head back so he can look away, past Dean, not into his brother’s eyes as he says, “Dean, just because they told you.” 

Dean cuts him off, takes Sam’s chin in his hand, forces Sam to look at him. “You know I hate talking about shit, so I’m only going to say this one more time before I fuck you right here. I am not going anywhere. You’re stuck with me. I don’t give a damn what anyone else says and I don’t give a damn about the loa, they’ll have to learn to deal with me. I’m not going anywhere and neither are you. Got it?”

Sam searches Dean’s eyes, finally rolls his eyes and leans forward, presses his lips against Dean’s for a split-second. Dean knows Sam could disappear if he wanted, knows Sam could run and make Dean forget all about his brother if he wanted, so when Sam says, “Got it,” a thrill of triumph runs up and down Dean’s spine. 

“Good,” Dean mutters, then strips Sam, flips him and presses his hands to the wall. “Don’t move them,” he orders, voice dark, ragged, and feels Sam shudder underneath him. 

They fuck and there’s nothing nice, soft, or gentle about it. Sam pants, scratches his nails into the wall, and Dean’s leaving fingerprint bruises on Sam’s hips, biting into the tattoos curling their way around Sam’s neck, raking his teeth over skin and drawing blood more often than not. It’s vicious, fast, and Dean buries his teeth in Sam’s shoulder when he comes. 

Sam’s pleading, begging, and Dean pulls out, drops to his knees and whirls Sam around, swallows Sam’s dick down his throat. Nails rake through his hair, dig into the back of his skull, and Sam comes, spills thick and salty inside of Dean’s mouth, head thrown back and body gleaming with sweat. 

Dean leans forward, rests one cheek on Sam’s hipbone, and tries to catch his breath, can feel Sam doing the same. 

“Stuck with you, huh?” Sam asks, and Dean looks up, surprised, but relaxes when he sees Sam smiling easy and lazy. “More like _to_ you.” 

Dean snorts, stands up, feels one knee pop, and leans on Sam, warmer and more inviting than the wall. “What’s a guy have to do to get some food around here?” he asks. “Because damn, I could eat a horse.”

Sam laughs, says, “How’s sandwiches sound? There’s a new place that just opened up a couple blocks over, they’re pretty good, and they should still be open.” At Dean’s puzzled look, Sam grins even wider, says, “Two a.m., give or take five minutes,” and nods at what Dean guesses is a clock behind him. 

“Sandwiches it is,” he says, reluctantly pulling himself away from Sam. He looks down at himself, still naked, wipes a stray strand of come off of his chin, and says, “Do we need to shower for sandwiches?” 

\--

Dean looks down at the plate in front of him with a raised eyebrow. Sam had said sandwiches, so Dean was thinking of something small, cut into four corners with fries or chips piled in the middle and a pickle spear on the side, but this plate is huge and the sandwich on it is even bigger. 

Sam, across from him, rubs his foot against Dean’s under the table, and after Dean looks up, says with a shrug, “It’s not New Orleans, not even the café in San Francisco, but they’re good. Still southern, y’know?” 

“Starting to get that impression,” Dean says, and ponders the best way to attack the sandwich on his plate, some kind of monstrous pile of meats and cheeses inside of enough bread to remind his stomach he hasn’t eaten more than beignets since the Georgia state line. Finally he just picks part of the sandwich up and hopes no one’s laughing at him. 

Sam grins when Dean looks at him, but doesn’t say anything, just does the same, and the two sit there in silence, stuffing their faces. Their waitress comes over with a pitcher of sweet tea, refills their glasses, says, “Y’all’re up late,” eyelashes flickering in invitation. 

Dean smiles, says, “Yes, ma’am, we are,” and doesn’t take her up on it. He sees Sam duck his head and try to hide a grin, and Dean’s smile turns warm, soft. He doesn’t realise the waitress is still looking at them until he sees her eyes widen in recognition, then she smiles, tilting her head to the side. 

“Y’all enjoying Savannah?” she asks, like if they aren’t, she’ll go after whoever’s responsible with her bare hands. 

This time it’s Sam who answers, and he lets loose with his best southern drawl, something Dean’s teased the edges of but has never actually heard, and he’s blindsided by how natural it sounds coming from Sam’s throat, how much it makes his cock throb. 

“Yes, ma’am,” Sam says. “Enjoyin’ it just fine, thanks for asking.” 

Dean’s phone, jammed in his pocket, starts ringing Styx, and he’s fishing it out as the waitress is smiling and telling them to wave her over if they need anything else. Dean's focused on Sam, the way Sam's watching him, so he doesn’t check the caller ID, answers without even looking, says, “Hello?” 

Sam looks over, frowning, and understands the sudden panic Dean’s showing as soon as Dean says, “Dad. Hi.”


End file.
